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REMONSTRANCE  AND  COMPLAINT 


ASSOCIATION  OF  FAIRFIELD  WEST, 


HARTFORD  CENTRAL  ASSOCIATION: 


tO(;f;thf.r  with  the 


REPLY  OF   THE  HARTFORD   CENTRAL  ASSOCIATION. 


PRINTED  FOR  THE  ASSOCIATION  OF  FAIRFIELD  WEST. 


NEW  YORK ; 

S.  W.  BENEDICT,  No,  16  SPRUCE  STREET. 
1850. 


REMONSTRANCE  AND  COMPLAINT 


ASSOCIATION  OF  FAIRFIELD  WEST. 


HARTFORD  CENTRAL  ASSOCIATION 


TOGETHER    WITH    THE 


REPLY  OF  THE  HARTFORD  CENTRAL  ASSOCIATION. 


PRINTED  FOR  THE  ASSOCIATION  OF  FAIRFIELD  WEST. 


NEW  YORK : 

S.  W.  BENEDICT,  No.  16  SPRUCE  STREET. 

1850. 


DEC     f  IM2 


MINUTES. 


The  Association  of  Fairfield  West  met  at  the  house  of  Rev. 
L.  H  Atwater,  in  Fairfield,  Jan.  8,  1850.,  at  11  A.  M.,  to  con- 
sider the  sentiments  of  Dr.  Bushnell,  as  published  in  a  book 
entitled  "  God  in  Christ,"  and  also  the  action  of  the  Hartford 
Centra]  Association  thereon. 

Were  present — Rev.  Elders  Nathaniel  Hewit,  D.D.,  E.  D. 
Kinney,  E.  Hall,  D.D.,  T.  Smith,  L.  H.  Atwater,  C.  T.  Pren- 
tice, T.  B.  Sturges,  L.  B.  Burr,  I.  Jennings,  and  S.  J.  M. 
Merwin. 

Opened  with  prayer.  Proceeded  to  consider  ihe  subject 
before  us.  Heard  and  considered  several  documents  on  this 
subject  by  members  of  the  Association.  Voted,  that  these 
documents  be  referred  to  a  committee  consisting  of  Messrs. 
Hall,  Smith  and  Atwater,  to  report  thereon  at  an  adjourned 
meeting.  Adjourned  to  meet  at  Stamford,  at  the  house  of 
Rev.  Isaac  Jennings,  on  the  29th  inst.,  at  11  A.  M.  Closed 
with  prayer. 

Attest,  Theophilus  Smith,  Scribe. 


The  Association  of  Fairfield  West  met  at  Stamford,  Jan. 
29,  1850,  at  11  A.  M.,  according  to  adjournment. 

Wei-e  2>resent,  Rev.  Elders  N.  Hewit,  D.D.,  J.  H.  Lins- 
ley,  U.D.,  E.  D.  Kinney,  E.  Hall,  D.D.,  T.  Smith,  L.  H.  At- 
V  water,  S.  B.  S.  Bissell,  T.  B.  Sturges,  I.  Jennings,  S.  J.  M. 
Merwin,  G.  M.  Porter,  A.  B.  Rich,  and  G.  Hall. 

Opened  with  prayer.  Dr.  Hall,  in  behalf  of  the  committee 
appointed  Jan.  8th,  made  a  report  in  the  form  of  a  Remon- 
strance and  Complaint  from  this  Association  to  the  Hartford 


Central  Association.  Proceeded  to  hear,  discuss  and  amend 
this  report.  The  roll  was  called,  and  each  member  expressed 
his  views.  Whereupon,  it  was  Voted,  that  this  Remonstrance 
and  Complaint  be  adopted  by  this  Association  ;  that  it  be 
signed  by  the  Moderator  and  Scribe,  and  sent  to  the  Mode- 
rator of  the  Hartford  Central  Association.  Adjourned. 
Closed  with  prayer. 

Attest,  Theophilus  Smith,  Scribe. 


The  Association  of  Fairfield  West  met  at  the  house  of  Rev. 
Dr.  Hall,  in  Norwalk,  March  19th,  1850,  at  11  A.M.,  to  hear 
the  answer  of  the  Hartford  Central  Association  to  our  Re- 
monstrance and  Complaint,  and  to  take  such  action  in  the 
premises  as  might  be  deemed  expedient. 

"PFere  present,  Rev.  Elders  S.  Haight,  M.  Mead,  N.  Hewit, 
D.D.,  E.  D.  Kinney,  E.  Hall,  D.D.,  T.  Smith,  D.  Mead,  L. 
H.  Atwater,  S.  B.  S.  Bissell,  C.  T.  Prentice,  T.  B.  Sturges, 
I.  Jennings,  S.  J.  M.  Merwin,  and  G.  Hall. 

Opened  with  prayer.  The  Answer  of  the  Hartford  Cen- 
tral Association  to  our  Remonstrance  and  Complaint,  was 
read.  Whereupon  it  was  FoterZ  unanimously,  that  our  Remon- 
strance and  Complaint  to  the  Hartford  Central  Association, 
and  their  Answer  to  the  same,  be  printed,  and  that  a  copy  be 
sent  to  each  member  of  the  several  District  Associations  in 
the  State. 

Voted,  unanimously,  that  we  address  a  letter  to  each  Dis- 
trict Association  (excepting  Hartford  Central),  earnestly  re- 
questing them  to  meet  and  consider  this  subject,  and  let  us 
know  the  conclusion  to  which  they  come. 

The  form  of  the  letter  to  be  addressed  to  each  District  As- 
sociation was  read  and  adopted. 

Attest,  Theophilus  Smith,  Scribe. 


KEMONSTKAi\OE   AiND   COMPLAINT 


Dear  Brethren : 

Our  relation  to  you  as  ministers  of  neighboring  churches 
which  have,  from  their  origin,  been  united  in  the  closest 
bonds  of  fellowship  with  the  churches  which  you  serve  in  the 
ministry,  and  that  under  the  acknowledged  principle — and  for 
more  than  one  hundred  years  under  the  express  stipulation 
[as  in  Chap,  IV.  of  the  Heads  of  Agreement] — "  That  they  are 
most  ready  and  wnlling  to  give  an  account  of  their  proceed- 
ings to  each  other,  when  desired  for  preventing  or  removing 
any  offenses  that  may  arise  among  them ;"  which  principle 
established  among  the  churches  must  be  regarded  as  equally 
in  force  among  their  ministers  ; — also  our  relation  to  you  as  an 
Association  united  with  you  in  the  General  Association  of 
Connecticut, — by  which  relation  we  stand  or  fall  with  you  in 
the  esteem  and  fellowship  of  the  churches  of  this  country  and 
of  the  world,  and  by  which  we  are  so  far  held  responsible  for 
acts  of  yours  which  may  justly  be  held  to  forfeit  that  esteem 
and  fellowship, — these  relations  not  only  give  us  the  right, 
but  impose  upon  us  the  duty,  when  we  judge  your  proceed- 
ings to  be  at  any  time  greatly  injurious  to  the  truth  in  Christ, 
to  come  before  you  with  our  earnest  but  brotherly  Remon- 
strance AND  Complaint.  From  these  relations,  also,  we  are 
under  obligation  to  the  churches,  to  the  community,  and  to 
God's  holy  Truth,  not  to  be  silent  when  our  silence  must  ne- 
cessarily be  considered  as  our  acquiescence  in  proceedings 
which  go  to  shield  or  to  countenance  destructive  error. 

We  judge  that  such  a  duty  is  imposed  upon  us  by  your  re- 
cently published  decision  in  the  matter  of  Dr.  Bushnell's  book 
entitled  "  God  in  Christ." 


The  duty  appears  to  us  now  to  be  urgent.  The  doctrines 
of  that  book  are  not  only  spread  abroad  in  the  book  itseh, 
deriving  no  small  celebrity  from  the  celebrity  of  its  author  ; 
but  there  has  also  been  circulated  a  reiteration  and  defense 
of  its  main  positions  under  the  sanction  of  honored  and  in- 
fluential names.  Communications  are  inserted  in  religious 
papers  having  a  wide  circulation  among  our  churches,  either 
vindicating  those  doctrines,  or  apologizing  for  them — at  times 
by  impugning  the  faith  of  our  churches — or  raising  questions 
as  to  how  it  can  be  decided  whether  the  doctrines  treated  of 
in  the  book  (viz.,  the  Trinity,  the  Atonement,  and  Justifica- 
tion.) are  fundamental,  or  so  far  forth  fundamental  that  any 
manner  of  denial  or  teaching  concerning  them  can  be  regarded 
as  heresy ;  or  whether  we  have  any  ascertainable  standard 
doctrines  on  these  subjects,  by  which  any  possible  doctrines 
concerning  the  Trinity,  Atonement,  or  Justification  may  be 
adjudged  heretical.  One  of  these  communications,  purport- 
ing to  be  from  a  minister  of  many  years'  standing  in  Connec- 
ticut, declares  his  doubts  concerning  the  truth  of  these  doc- 
trines, as  held  in  our  churches,  and  affirms,  on  his  own  know- 
ledge, that  many  ministers  around  him  are  also  doubting  the 
same.  AH  which  things,  with  other  considerations  which  we 
have  not  mentioned,  have  caused  us  to  fear  lest  the  doctrines 
of  that  book  may  be  already  gaining  a  dangerous  ascendancy — 
especially  over  the  minds  of  the  young — and  preparing  the  way 
for  a  wide-spread  error,  captivating  to  the  carnal  mind,  but  de- 
structive of  the  faith,  and  ruinous  to  the  souls  of  men.  These 
things  have  also  caused  ministers  and  churches  abroad — who 
are  in  communication  with  us — to  doubt  whether  there  is  not 
among  the  ministers  and  churches  of  Connecticut  a  serious 
and  wide-spread  departure  from  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Christ ; 
which  doubts,  in  the  continued  silence  of  our  Associations, 
we  cannot  but  regard  as  justifiable.  Under  these  circum- 
stances, the  doctrines  of  the  book  now  go  abroad  bearing  the 
sanction  of  your  official  decision,  that  you  regard  their  author 
"  as  holding  whatever  is  essential  to  the  scheme  "  embodied 


in  "  the  formulas  of  the  church,"  and  that,  in  your  view,  "he 
could  not  be  properly  or  justly  subjected  to  the  charge  of 
heresy,  or  be  denied  the  confidence  of  his  brethren  in  the 
ministry."  Yet  we  fin?f  that  your  "  committee  were  unanimous 
in  the  conviction,"  (and  "  all  the  members  of  the  committee 
acceded  to  the  proposition  "  so  to  report ;  which  report  w^as 
read  to  your  Association  and  accepted  with  the  two  other  re- 
ports,) that  the  book  in  question  "denies  that  the  following 
are  revealed  truths,  viz. : 

"  1.  That  there  is  a  real  Trinity  in  the  Divine  nature." 

"  2.  That,  anterior  to  the  incarnation,  the  personality  of 
Christ  was  distinct  from  that  of  the  Father." 

"  3.  That  the  end  sought  and  achieved  by  Christ,  in  making 
the  atonement,  was  to  cancel  the  penal  claims  of  condemning 
law,  by  voluntarily  offering  his  own  sufferings  and  death  as 
a  sufficient  satisfaction  therefor,  and  so  to  redeem  every  be- 
liever from  further  exposure  to  these  claims." 

Permit  us  to  say,  brethren,  that  when  we  consider  the  terms 
in  which  the  book  denies  not  only  these,  but  other  doctrines, 
which  we  hold  as  essential  to  Christianity,  we  are  much 
amazed  and  grieved  at  your  decision. 

We  ask  you  once  more  to  review  with  us  the  doctrines  set 
forth  in  that  book.  We  give  you  a  statement  of  the  doctrines 
which,  as  we  believe,  the  book  contains,  with  the  passages 
which  contain  them  written  underneath.  We  underscore 
parts  of  these  passages,  to  call  to  them  your  especial  atten- 
tion. 

I. — Concerning  the  Logos,  or  Word. 

The  Logos,  or  Word,  which  was  in  the  beginning  with 
God,  [p.  145,]  called  elsewhere  zAe  Form  of  God,  [p.  145,]  and 
which,  at  the  incarnation,  was  made  flesh,  is  a  capacity  of 
self-expression  in  God,  [pp.  187,  177,  145,]  by  which  he  can 

[P.  187.]  "  By  the  Word,  or  Word  of  Life,  that  peculiar /^ower  in  the  Di- 
vine nature,  by  lohich  God  is  able  to  represent  Himself  outwardly  in  the 
forms  of  things,  first  in  the  worlds,  and  now  in  the  human  person" — "  by 
this  Word  of  Life,  God  has  now  expressed  himself." 

[P.  177.]  "  Undoubtedly  the  distinction  of  the  AVord,  or  the  power  of  self- 
representation  in  God  thus  denominated,  is  eternal." 


outwardly  produce  himself  [p.  146.]  In  creating  the  worlds, 
God  only  represents,  expresses,  outwardly  produces  Himself, 
[p.  145,]  first  in  the  worlds,  then  in  men,  [p.  146,]  and  at  the 
incarnation,  as  God  has  before  produced  himself  in  all  the 
other  finite  forms  of  being,  and  as  he  has  before  appeared  in 
the  human,  so  now,  yet  more  of  God  is  exhibited  in  the  human 
frrm,  in  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ,  [pp.  145,  146,  147,  151, 
152.] 

[Pp.  145,  146.]  "  There  is  ia  Goel,  taken  as  the  Absolute  Being,  a  capa- 
city of  se/f-exjn'cssion,  so  to  speak,  which  is  peculiar — a  generative  power  of 
form,  a  creative  imagination,  in  which,  or  by  aid  of  which,  He  can  produce 
Himself  outwardly,  or  represent  himself  in  the  finite.  In  this  respect  God 
is  wholly  unlike  to  us.  Our  imagination  is  passive,  stored  with  forms,  co- 
lors and  types  of  words  from  without,  borrowed  from  the  world  we  live  in. 
But  all  such  forms  God  has  in  himself,  and  this  is  the  Logos,  the  AVord,  else- 
where called  the  Form  of  God.  Now,  this  Word,  the  Form  of  God,  in  which 
he  sees  himself,  is  ivith  God,  as  John  says, /rom  the  beginning.  It  is  God 
mirrored  before  his  own  understanding,  and  to  be  mirrored,  as  in  fragments 
of  the  mirror,  before  us.  Conceive  him  now  as  creating  the  worlds,  or  creating 
worlds,  if  you  please,  from  eternity.  In  so  doing,  he  only  represents,  ex- 
presses, or  outwardly  produces  Himself.  He  bodies  out  his  own  thoughts. 
What  we  call  the  creation,  is,  in  another  view,  a  revelation  only  of  God,  his 

fii'st  revelation  " "  Now  as  John  also  declares,  there  was  light,  the 

first  revelation  was  made,  God  was  expressed  in  the  forms  and  relations  of 

the  finite." "  One  thing  more  is  possible  that  will  yield  a  still  more 

eflulgent  light,  viz.,  that,  as  God  has  produced  himself  in  eil  I  the  other  finite 
forms  of  being,  so  now  he  should  appear  in  the  human." 

"  Indeed,  He  has  apjjeared  in  the  human  before,  in  the  same  icay  as  He  has 

in  all  the  created  objects  of  the  world." [P.  147.]  "  But  there  was  yet 

more  of  God  to  be  exhibited  in  the  Human  Form  of  our  race." "  Now, 

therefore,  God  will  reclaim  this  last  type  of  Himself,  possess  it  with  his  own 
life  and  feeling,  and  through  that,  live  himself  into  the  acquaintance  and  bio- 
graphic history  of  the  world." — "  This  is  Christ,  whose  proper  deity  or  divi- 
nity we  have  proved." 

[P.  151.]  "  But  the  human  person,  it  will  be  said  is  limited,  and  God  is 
not.  Very  true.  But  you  have  the  same  objection  in  reference  to  the  first 
revelation,  the  Word,  in  the  world." "  Besides  you  have  a  special  de- 
light in  seeing  God  in  the  smallest  things,  the  minutest  specks  of  being.  If, 
then,  it  be  incredible  that  God  should  take  the  human  to  express  himself,  be- 
cause the  human  is  finite,  can  the  finite  in  the  world,  or  in  a  living  atom, 
express  him  more  worthily,  or  do  it  more  accordantly  with  reason  .'"  [P. 152.] 
"  For  it  no  more  follows  that  a  human  body  measures  God,  when  revealed 
through  it,  than  that  a  star,  a  tree,  or  an  insect  measures  him,  when  he  is  re- 
vealed through  that. " 

REMARKS. 

1.  These  representations  of  the  Word  and  of  the  incarna- 
tion appear  to  us  to  teach  that  the  Word  is  no  person  in  the 
Godhead,  but  only  a  power,  or  capacity,  viz.  :  the  power  of 
outwardly  expressing  or  producing  himself;  and  that  in  ac- 
cordance with  this  teaching,  the  Scriptures  should  not  say 


"  The  Word  was  God,"  but  "  The  Word  was  a  power  in 
God."    " 

2.  The  passages  referred  to,  as  they  stand  in  their  connec- 
tion, appear  to  us  to  teach  that  the  Logos  had  as  really  ex- 
pressed and  outwardly  produced  God,  in  the  world,  (viz.  :  in 
its  rocks,  rivers,  mountains,  forests,  beasts,  stars  and  storms,) 
as  in  Jesus  Christ ;  and  that  God  had  before  appeared  in  men 
as  really,  though  not  in  the  same  degree,  as  in  Christ.  Ac- 
cording to  the  doctrine  of  the  book,  we  do  not  see  why  it 
would  not  be  as  proper  to  say  concerning  each  mountain, 
river,  beast  or  man,  "  This  is  the  true  God,"  as  to  say  it  con- 
cerning the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  In  our  view,  the  book  repre- 
sents the  works  of  God  to  be  as  truly  the  Godhead  as  Christ ; 
the  Word,  which  became  incarnate  in  Jesus,  having  been  be- 
fore embodied  in  the  material  creation,  and  having  been  as 
truly  made  flesh  before — in  beasts  and  men — as  in  Jesus 
Christ ;  the  only  difference  being,  that  in  Christ  there  is  ex- 
hibited more  of  God,  [p.  147.] 

II. — Concerning  the  Trinity. 
The  Trinity  is  a  three-fold  impersonation  which  appears 
at  the  incarnation  ;  not  an  essential  Trinity  in  the  Divine 
Being,  but  only  a  Trinity  in  the  mode  of  representation,  as 
related  to  our  finite  apprehension,  [pp.  147,  148,  175,  176. 
As  the  power  of  self-representation  in  God  is  eternal,  if  God 

[Pp.  147-8.]  "  Prior  to  this  momenc,  [the  incarnation,]  there  has  been 
ho  appearance  of  trinity  in  the  revelations  God  has  made  of  his  being  ;  but 
just  here,  whether  as  resulting  from  the  incarnation  or  as  implied  in  it,  we 
are  not  informed,  a  threefold  personality,  or  impersonation  of  God  begins  to 
offer  itself  to  view."  "  In  these  three  persons  or  impersonations,  I  only  see 
a  revelation  of  the  Absolute  Being,  under  just  such  relatives  as  by  their 
mutual  play,  in  and  before  our  imaginative  sense,  will  produce  in  us  the 
truest  knoAvledge  of  God." 

[P.  175.]  "  Do  you  then  ask,  whether  I  mean  simply  to  assert  a  modal  tri- 
nity, or  three  modal  persons  ?  I  must  answer  obscurely,  just  as  I  answered 
in  regard  to  the  humanity  of  Christ.  If  I  say  that  they  are  modal  only,  as 
the  word  is  commonly  used,  I  may  deny  more  than  I  am  justified  in  deny- 
ing, or  am  required  to  deny,  by  the  ground  I  have  taken." "  Perhaps 

I  shall  come  nearest  to  the  simple,  positive  idea  of  the  trinity  here  maintain- 
ed, if  I  call  it  an  instrumental  trinity,  and  the  persons  instrumental 
PERSONS.  There  may  be  more  in  them  than  this,  which  let  others  declare 
when  they  find  it." 

[P.  176.]  "  I  perceive,  too,  that  God  may  as  well  offer  himself  to  me,  in 
thesepersonSf  as  through  trees,  or  storms,  or  stars." 


10 

has  eternally  rev^ealed  himself,  then  this  Trinity  is  likely  always 
to  have  been,  and  in  like  manner  it  lyiay  always  continue  to 
be.  Yet  it  may  be,  even  as  a  representation,  occasional  and 
to  be  discontinued,  [p.  177. J  The  Scriptures  discourage  the 
idea  that  it  is  to  continue,  [p.  177.]  It  is  a  trinity  of  repre- 
sentation only,  produced  by  a  process  of  revelation,  [p.  178.] 
There  is  no  original  triad  (or  Trinity  in  the  Godhead)  back 
of  this  that  is  so  produced ;  and  people  had  better  keep  their 
discretion  than  to  seek  for  one. —  [178,  179,  180.] 

[P.  176,  177.]  "  Meanwhile,  if  our  feeling  is,  at  any  time,  confused  by 
these  persons  or  impersonations,  we  are  to  have  it  for  a  fixed,  first  truth, 
that  God  is,  in  the  most  perfect  and  rigid  sense,  one  being — a  pure  intelli- 
gence, undivided,  indivisible  and  infinite  ;  and  that  whatever  may  be  true  of 
the  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost,  it  certainly  is  not  true  that  they  are  three 
distinct  consciousnesses,  wills,  and  understandings.  Or,  speaking  in  a  way 
more  positive,  they  are  instrumental  I y  three — three  simply  as  related  to  our 
finite  apprehension,  and  the  communication  of  God's  incommunicable  na- 
ture." 

[P.  177.]  "But  some  one,  I  supjDose,  will  require  of  me  to  answer,  it'^e- 
ther  the  three  persons  are  eternal,  or  only  occasional  and  to  be  discontinued  ? 
Undoubtedly  the  distinction  of  the  Word,  or  the  power  of  self-representa- 
tion in  God  thus  denominated,  is  eternal.  And  in  this  we  liave  a  permanent 
ground  of  possibility  for  the  threefold  impersonation,  called  trinity.  Ac- 
cordingly, if  God  has  been  eternally  revealed,  or  refea/m^  Himself  to  created 
minds,  it  is  likely  always  to  have  been,  and  always  to  be  as  the  Father,  Son, 
and  Holy  Ghost.  Consequently,  it  may  always  be  in^this  manner  that  we  shall 
get  our  impressions  of  God,  and  have  our  communion  with  Him.  As  an  ac- 
commodation to  all  finite  minds  in  the  universe,  it  may  be  the  purpose  of 
Jehovah  to  be  known  by  this  divine  formula  for  ever.  That  which  most  dis- 
courages such  a  belief  is  the  declaration  of  Paul — "  When  all  things  shall  be 
subdued  unto  him,  then  shall  the  Son  also  himself  be  subject  unto  him  that 
did  put  all  things  under  him,  that  God  may  be  all,  and  in  all." 

[P.  178,  9,  180.]  (After  a  citation  from  Neander.)  "  If  now  it  be  inquired 
whether,  beginning  with  a  doctrine  of  trinity  produced  by  the  process  of  reve- 
lation, and  adequately  accounted  for  as  necessary  to  that  process,  I  would  then 
turn  to  hunt  for  some  "  analogy"  in  myself,  and  try  to  climb  up  thus,  through 
myself,  into  a  discovery  of  au  original  triad  in  God — convincing  myself,  also, 
that  John  and  Paul  give  •  intimations'  of  such  a  triad,  I  frankly  answer, 
no.  The  expression  of  such  a  hope  might  comfort  some  who  would  other- 
wise be  disturbed,  but  it  will  only  mislead  a  much  greater  number,  who  had 
better  keep  their  discretion.  If  God  has  given  us  an  instrumental  triad  which 
is  good  for  its  purposes  of  revelation,  there  can  be  no  greater  fraud  upon  it 
than  to  set  ourselves  to  the  discovery  of  an  original  triad  back  of  it,  that  has 
no  instrumental  character,  and  has  nothing  to  do  with  revelation. 

[P.  180.]  "  This  view  of  Christ  and  the  trinity  diifcrs,  I  am  aware,  in 
some  respects,  from  that  which  is  commonly  held  ;  but  I  hope  the  difierence 
Avill  not  disturb  you.  I  have  known  no  other  since  I  began  to  be  a  preacher 
of  Christ,  and  my  experience  teaches  me  to  want  no  other.  If  it  has  delivered 
me  from  agonies  of  mental  darkness  and  confusion  concerning  God,  w]iich,at 
one  time,  seemed  insupportable,  it  cannot  be  wrong  to  hope  that  God  will 
make  the  truth  a  deliverance,  equally  comfortable  and  joyful  to  some  of 
you." 


11 


REMARKS 


1.  We  regard  these  passages  as  teaching  unequivocally, 
that  there  is  no  Trinity  in  the  Godhead. 

2.  According  to  the  teaching  of  the  book  on  the  subject  of 
the  Trinity,  we  see  not  why  the  representation  of  the  scrip- 
ture might  not  have  been, — so  far  as  the  Godhead  itself  is 
concerned — of  a  Quaternity  as  well  as  of  a  Trinity,  a  Myriad, 
as  well  as  of  a  Triad  :  nor  why  there  might  not  have  been  any 
number  of  Christs,  as  well  as  the  one  who  is  styled  "  The  only 
begotten  Son  of  God." 

3.  As  no  real  sacrifice,  or  work  of  atonement,  can  be  per- 
formed by  a  mere  representation  of  a  person,  without  the  re- 
ahty,  it  appears  to  us  that  this  denial  of  the  Trinity  in  the 
Godhead,  is  necessarily  followed  by  a  denial  of  any  real  work 
of  Redemption  by  the  blood  of  Christ.  The  doctrine  of  Justi- 
fication by  faith  in  that  atoning  sacrifice  must,  also,  inevitably 
be  denied :  as  we  shall  see  (hat  both  are  denied  in  the  book 
in  question.  It  is  from  this  necessary  connection  of  the  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity,  with  the  other  fundamental  doctrines  of 
Christianity,  that  the  doctrine  must  needs  become  an  article  of 
faith ;  and  is  not,  and  cannot  be,  a  point  of  mere  speculation, 
but  becomes  a  doctrine  in  the  utmost  degree  practical  and 
vital. 

III. — Concerning  the  Law  of  God. 

God  does  not,  without  the  provisions  of  the  Gospel,  hold 
every  transgressor  to  punishment  according  to  the  letter  of  his 
law.  The  law  has  no  certain  claim  of  punishment  upon  the 
sinner,  any  longer  than  till  he  repents.  It  needs  no  atoning 
sacrifice  to  satisfy  its  penal  demands,  or  to  vindicate  the  jus- 
tice of  God  while  he  passes  by  the  transgressions  of  the  sin- 
ner. It  is  a  groundless  assumption  to  suppose  that  it  does  so. 
— [p.  198.]     Christ  did  nothing  to  satisfy  any  penal  demands 

[P.  198.]  "First,  it  [the  more  mitigated  orthodox  theory]  assumes  that, 
as  punishment  expresses  the  uhhomnce  of  God  to  sin,  or,  what  is  the  same, 
his  justice,  He  can  sustain  his  law,  <ind  lay  a  ground  of  forgiveness  without 
punishment,  only  by  some  equivalent  expression  of  ahhorrcjice — an  assumption 
that  is  groundless  and  without  consideration,  as  I  may  cause  to  appear  in 
another  place."- 


12 

of  the  broken  law,  nor  to  vindicate  the  justice  of  God  ;  all 
that  he  did,  and  all  that  needed  to  be  done,  was  to  make  men 
penitent. — [pp.  2 10-2 ID.]  Indeed,  if  the  doctrine  were  that 
the  Law,  without  the  provision  of  the  Gospel,  holds  every 
transgressor  to  punishment,  according  to  its  declared  penalty, 
we  should  reason  the  doctrine  away,  and  reject  it  as  incredi- 

[Pp.  216-219.]  "  But  -what,  in  this  view,  some  will  ask,  becomes  of  the 
law  and  justice  of  God  ?  First,  we  have  Christ,  interrupting  the  flow  of 
justice  by  delivering  men,  or  assisting  them  to  deliver  themselves  from  the 
penal  consequences  of  transgression  ;  from  the  blindness,  bitterness, 
DEADNEss,  AND  OTHER  DISABILITIES  IT  PRODUCES.  Sccondlj,  there  is  made 
out,  or  given  to  men,  a  confidence  equally  rejmgnant  to  justice,  that  God  will 
freely  accept,  embrace,  and  even  justify  the  transgressor  who  forsakes  his 
SIN.  Where,  now,  it  will  be  asked,  is  government  ?  AVhat  becomes  of  law  .' 
And  since  God's  love  of  right,  or,  what  is  the  same,  his  justice,  was  evidenced 
by  his  law,  and  tlie  penalties  added  to  enforce  it,  what  shall  save  the  obliga- 
tion of  tlie  law ;  what,  indeed,  shall  dis^Dlace  the  ambiguity  that  shades  the 
divine  character  itself?  Hence  the  necessity,  it  is  argued,  of  some  vicarious 
suifering,  or  expression  made  by  suffering,  that  shall  vindicate  the  law  as 
eftectiveiy  as  the  penalties  remitted  would  have  done,  and  thus  shall  save 
the  moral  rigor  of  God's  integrity,  in  the  view  of  his  subjects.  But,  grant- 
ing this,  it  does  not  follow  that  the  new  vicarious  expression  of  God  must  be 
made  by  a  process  equally  vindictive  with  punishment ;  or  that  God's  abhor- 
rence to  sin  must  be  poured  out  upon  ChrisVs  own  person." 

"  If  a  vindication  of  God's  law  is  wanted,  in  order  to  the  offer  of  for- 
giveness, it  is  wanted  here,  and  for  effect  in  this  icorld.  And  if  we  nar- 
rowly inspect  the  case  presented,  we  shall  be  at  no  loss  in  regard  to  the  real 
ground  of  such  a  necessity.  For  it  is  even  a  fundamental  condition,  as  re- 
gards moral  effect  on  our  character,  that,  wliile  courage  and  Iiope  are  given  us , 
we  should  be  made,  at  the  same  time,  to  feel  the  intensest  possible  sense  of 
the  sanctity  of  the  law,  and  the  inflexible  righteousness  of  God.  What  we 
need,  in  this  view,  is  some  new  expression  of  God,  which,  taken  as  addressed 
to  us,  will  keep  alive  the  impression  in  us  that  God  suffers  no  laxity.  In  a 
word,  we  must  be  made  to  feel,  in  the  very  article  of  forgiveness,  Avhen  it  is 
offered,  the  essential  and  eternal  sanctity  of  God's  law — His  own  immovable 
adherence  to  it,  as  the  only  basis  of  order  and  well-being  in  the  universe. 

"  As  to  the  manner  in  which  this  desired  restilt  is  effected,  since  it  presents 
the  hinge  question  at  issue  betv/een  Unitarianism  and  orthodoxy,  I  will 
dilate  upon  it  here  as  the  gravity  of  the  question  demands. 

"  On  one  side,  it  is  afiirmed  that  God  could  not  forgive  sin,  either  without 
an  equivalent  suffering  or  an  equivalent  expression  ((f  abhorrence  to  sin  made 
Ijy  suffering,  in  the  place  of  2nmishm€nt.  On  the  other  side,  since  this  doc- 
trine, in  eitlier  form  of  it,  seems  to  involve  something;  offensive  to  our  moral  sense, 
or  repugnant  to  our' ideas  of  God,  it  is  afiirmed  that  God,  out  of  his  simple 
goodness  or  paternity,  can  forgive,  and  will  forgive  every  truly  penitent 
sinner.  Satisfied  with  neither  doctrine,  for  the  reasons  urged  by  one  against 
the  other,  and,  perhaps  I  should  say,  with  both,  for  the  reasons  urged  by 
each  in  its  own  behalf,  I  venture  to  suggest,  as  the  more  real  and  reasonable 
view,  that,  in  order  to  make  men  penitent  and  soto  want  forgiveness, — 
that  is,  to  l<eep  the  world  alive  to  the  eternal  integrity,  verity,  and  sanctity  of 
God's  law, — that  is,  to  keep  us  apprised  of  sin,  and  deny  us  any  power  of  rest 
while  tvQ  continue  binder  sin  ;  it  was  needful  that  Christ,  in  his  life  and  suf- 
ferings, should  consecrate,  or  re-consecrate  the  desecrated  law  of  God,  and 
give  it  a  more  exact  and  imminent  authority  than  it  had  before — this,  too, 


13 

ble  ;  so  that  it  would  have  no  verity,  and,  of  course,  no  sa- 
credness  at  all. — [pp.  228,  229.] 

without  a7iytlnng  of  peiial  qualify  in  his  passion,  Tvithout  regarding  him  as 
bearing  evil  to  pay  the  re/ease  of  evil,  or  as  under  any  infliction  or  frown  of 
God,  and  yet  doing  it  by  something  expressed  in  his  life  and  death." 

[Pp.  228,  229.]  "  This  suffering  [of  Christ]  is  expressive,  because  it  is  in- 
cidental to  an  effort  to  reveal  the  love  of  God,  and  bring  the  eternal  life 
into  the  closest  possible  proximity  to  our  human  hearts." — "  If  we  look  upon 
it  as  the  very  end  and  aim  of  Christ's  mission  to  recover  man  to  God  and 
obedience;  or,  what  is  the  same,  to  re-establish  tlie  law  as  a  living  power  in 
his  heart;  then,  of  course,  everything  he  does  and  suffers,  every  labor, 
weariness,  self-denial,  and  sorrow,  becomes  an  exj^ression  of  his  sense  of  the 
value  of  the  law — every  pang  he  endures,  declares  its  sacredness.  So  that  if 
he  offers  pardon,  free  pardon,  to  every  transgressor,  we  shall  never  connect 
a  feeling  of  license,  but  shall  rather  feel  a  sense  of  the  eternal  sanctity  of  the 
law,  and  have  a  more  tremulous  awe  of  it  in  our  conscience,  than  we  should 
if  every  transgressor  were  held  to  punishment  by  the  letter  of  it.  Indeed,  if 
that  were  the  doctrine,  we  should  reason  away  and  reject  the  doctrine  as  in- 
credible ;  so  that  it  woidd  have  no  verity,  and,  of  course,  no  sacredtiess  at  all. 
Whereas,  having  seen,  in  the  pains-taking,  suli'ering  life  of  Jesus,  what  God 
will  do  for  the  practical  establishment  of  his  law,  we  are  seized  with  a  deep 
and  awe-felt  conviction,  that  if  we  do  not  return  to  it  according  to  his  call, 
there  is  yet  something  different  that  must  assuredly  follow.  All  this,  you 
perceive,  without  anything  said  of  a  penal  quality,  in  the  sufferings  of  Christ. 
Ao  evil  is  laid  upon  him  as  evil,  by  the  Father,  to  be  endured  retributively. 
He  only  suffers  the  ills  that  lie  iti  his  way,  and  endures  the  violence  that  hu- 
man malignity  and  cruelty  heap  on  his  head." 

REMARKS. 

While  the  author,  in  these  passages,  confesses  the  necessity 
of  keeping  up  an  impression  of  the  eternal  sanctity  and  verity 
of  the  law,  he  teaches  that  this  object  is  effected  by  a  scheme  es- 
sentially different  from  that  which  God  has  revealed,  and  utterly 
subversive  of  the  great  central  and  fundamental  truth  of  the 
Gospel.  We  regard  him  as  denying  the  vindicatory  power  o{ 
the  law,  stripping  it  of  its  sanctions,  and  leaving  it  mere  ad- 
vice, and  no  longer  law.  Indeed,  he  declares,  that  if  God 
were  to  instruct  us  that  every  transgressor  is,  by  the  power 
of  law,  and  by  the  divine  justice,  w^ithout  the  Gospel,  held  to 
punishment  according  to  the  declared  penalty,  we  should 
reason  avv^ay  and  reject  such  a  declaration  as  incredible,  so 
that  it  would  have  no  veritv,  and  of  course  no  sacredness  at  all. 


14 

IV. — Concerning  the  Fall. 
The  fall  of  man  was,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  an  a  priori 
necessity  ;  and,  of  course,  a  historic  certainty.  It  was  to  be 
expected  that  the  soul,  under  a  simple  commandment  of  God, 
would  yield  to  the  instigation  of  her  curious  nature,  and  try 
the  bad  experience  of  evil.  We  accordingly  look,  reason- 
ably and  necessarily,  for  a  lapse  under  the  first  discipline  of 
law.— [pp.  238-240.] 

[Pp.  238-240.]  "  The  first  stage  of  government  is  the  stage  of  law.  But 
law,  taken  by  itself,  can  establish  nothing.  There  is  an  a  priori  necessity, 
and,  of  course,  a  historic  certainty^  that  the  training  of  an  empire  of  free  be- 
ings, and  the  final  and  complete  union  of  their  will  to  God,  will  require  a 
double  adnmiistration." — "  Under  the  first  stage,  that  of  commandment,  the 
soul  makes  her  acquaintance  with  obligation,  comes  at  the  terms,  so  to  speak, 
of  her  existence,  lays  her  hands  upon  the  iron-fences  of  law  that  stiifen  round 
her.  Will  she  keep  within  her  inclosures  .'  If  we  speak  of  a  naked  possi- 
bility, she  doubtless  may.  But  it  will  be  wonderful  if  she  does  not  some- 
times yield  to  the  instigation  of  her  curious  nature,  and  try  the  bad  ex- 
perience of  evil.  Or  if  she  does  not,  if  she  stays  within  her  iron  inclosure, 
only  because  it  is  iron,  she  would  seem  to  be  governed  in  the  good  she  fol- 
lows, by  constraint;  which  can  hardly  be  regarded  as  a  state  oif  perfect  vir- 
tue— it  is  a  prudential,  and  even  a  cringing  virtue,  more  than  a  virtue  of  liberty. 

"  Accordingly,  tuc  look  for  a  lapse,  under  this  first  discijjline  of  law.  Feeling  its 
bars,  as  the  bars  of  a  cage,  about  her,  the  soul  begins  to  chafe  against  them, 
and  so  she  learns  the  law — first,  by  attrition  against  it,  and  then  by  bondage 
under  it.     This  is  her  fall." 

REMARKS. 

We  regard  this,  1,  As  setting  forth  the  principle  that  a 
simple  commandment  of  God  is,  with  holy  beings,  no  sufficient 
ground  of  obedience  :  but  if  left  with  this  alone,  and  put  upon 
their  simple  love,  faith,  and  duty,  they  are  to  be  expected  to 
transgress  : 

2.  As  palliating  the  guilt  of  the  fall,  by  representing  it  as 
reasonably  to  be  expected — an  a  priori  necessity,  arising  from 
a  natural  curiosity  and  irksomeness  of  restraint,  which,  even 
in  holy  beings,  naturally  required  a  second  administration  be- 
fore complete  obedience  is  to  be  expected  : 

3.  That  for  holy  beings  to  obey  God,  simply  because  he  is 
God,  and  because,  as  such,  he  commands,  is  a  prudential 
and  even  a  cringing  virtue.  The  whole  goes  to  teach  men 
lightly  to  esteem  the  Divine  authority  ;  and  to  vindicate  crea- 
tures in  rebellion  against  the  law  of  God,  until  some  other 
further  dispensation  is  given  to  restrain  tliem,  than  the  dispen- 
sation of  law. 


15 

V. — Concerning  the  Atonement. 

(yHRisTdid  not  die  to  redeem  us  from  the  penalty  of  the  law. 
He  did  not  bear  our  sins  in  the  sense  of  delivering  us  from  the 
penalty  by  his  sufferings.  His  blood  was  not,  truly,  shed  for 
many  for  the  7-emissio7i  oi^ s'ms. — [pp.  218,  219.]  He  did  not  die 
a  vicarious  sacrifice,  the  just  for  the  unjust. — [p.  189.]  He  is 
not  in  that  sense  the  propitiation  for  our  sins.  There  was  no 
design  of  expiation,  or  of  vicarious  or  penal  suffering,  in  His 
death. — [pp.  236,  237.]  He  did  not  come  into  the  world  for 
the  purpose  of  dying  for  us  :  that  would  have  been  ostenta- 
tious and  absurd. — [pp.  201,202.]     If  God  could  for  one  mo- 

[Pp.  218-219.]  "  On  one  side,  it  is  afiSrmed  tliat  God  could  not  forgive 
sin,  either  without  an  equivalent  suffering,  or  an  equivalent  expression  of  ab- 
horrence to  sin  made  by  suffering,  in  the  place  of  punishment.'''' — [P.  219.] 
"  I  venture  to  suggest,  as  the  more  real  and  reasonable  view,  that,  in  order 
to  make  men  penitent,  and  so  to  want  forgiveness — that  is,  to  keep  the  world 
alive  to  the  eternal  integrity,  verity,  and  sanctity  of  God's  law — that  is,  to 
keep  us  apprised  of  sin,  and  deny  us  any  power  of  rest  while  we  continue 
under  sin,  it  was  needful  that  Christ,  in  his  life  and  sufferings  should,  con- 
secrate or  re-consecrate  the  desecrated  law  of  God,  and  give  it  a  more  exact 
and  imminent  authority  than  it  had  before — tliis,  too,  without  anything  of  a 
penal  quality  iii  his  jmssiori,  without  regarding  him  as  bearing  evil  to  pay 
THE  RELEASE  OF  EVIL,  or  CIS  Wider  any  infliction  or  frozen  of  God,  and 
yet  doing  it  by  something  expressed  in  his  life  and  death." 

P.  189.]  Clirist  enters  into  human  feelings  by  liis  incarnate  charities  and 
sufferings,  to  re-engage  the  world's  love,  and  to  re-unite  the  world,  as  free, 
to  the  Eternal  Life.  To  sum  up  all  in  one  condensed  and  luminous  utterance, 
every  word  of  which  is  power,  God  was  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world  unto 
Himself.  Tlie  apostle  says  nothing  here,  it  will  be  observed,  of  reconciling 
God  to  men,  he  only  speaks  of  reconciling  men  to  God.  Had  he  said,  the 
Life  of  God  was  manifested  in  Jesus  Christ,  to  quicken  the  world  in  love  and 
truth,  and  rewiite  it  to  himself,  he  would  have  said  the  same  thing  under  a 
different  form.  I  am  well  aware  that,  in  offering  such  a  statement,  as  the 
true  doctrine  of  Christ  and  his  work,  I  affirm  nothing  that  is  distinctively 
orthodox,  and  shall  even  seem  to  rule  out  that  view  of  Christ  "as  a  sacri- 
fice, an  expiation  for  sin,  a  vicarioiis  .siffc7ing,  vfhich,  to  the  view  of  most  or- 
thodox Christians,  contains  the  real  moment  of  his  work  as  a  Savior." 

P.  [201.]  "Once  more,  it  is  to  be  noticed,  as  a  law  of  expression,  that 
when  evil  is  endured,  simply  and  only  for  what  it  expresses,  it  expresses  no- 
thing. If  a  man  wades  out  upon  some  mountain,  in  the  snows  of  a  wintry 
night,  to  carry  food  to  a  perishing  family,  tlien  what  he  encounters  of  risk 
and  siiffering,  being  incidentally  encountered,  is  an  expression  of  charity. 
But  if  he  calls  upon  us  to  observe  his  charity  expressed  in  what  he  will  suf- 
fer, and,  waiting  for  a  stormy  night,  goes  forth  on  the  same  expedition  to 
the  mountain,  he  expresses  7iothing  but  ostentation.  So  if  Christ  comes  into 
the  world  to  teach,  to  cheer,  to  heal,  to  pour  his  sympathies  into  the  bosom  of 
all  human  sorrow,  to  assert  the  integrity  of  truth,  and  rebuke  '  the  wick- 
edness of  sin  ' — in  a  word,  to  manifest  the  Eternal  Life,  and,bring  it  into  a 
quickening  union  with  the  souls  of  our  race,  then  to  suffer  iNcinENTALLY, 
to  die  an  ignominious  and  cruel  death  rather  than  depart  from  his  heavenly 
errand,  is  to  make  an  expression  of  the  Heart  of  God,  which  every  human 


16 

ment  lay  his  frown  (or  penal  suffering,)  upon  the  soul  of  the 
innocent,  He  can  be  no  such  Being  as  the  author  of  the  book 
in  question  has  loved  and  worshiped. — [pp.  198-201.]  No 
governmental  reasons  can  justify  such  a  substitution  of  the 
innocent  for  the  guilty.  If  the  great  Redeemer,  in  the 
excess  of  His  goodness,  consents  freely  to  offer  Himself  to 
the  Father,  or  to  God,  to  receive  the  penal  woes,  or  some  suf- 
ficient part  of  the  penal  woes,  in  his  own  person ;  and  if  the 
Father  accepts  the  sacrifice,  then  the  Divine  government,  in- 
stead of  clearing  itself,  assumes  the  double  ignominy,  first,  of 
letting  the  guilty  go,  and  secondly,  of  accepting  the  sufferings 

soul  must  feel.  And  this  expression  may  avail  to  sanctify  the  law  before  us. 
even  though  there  be  no  abhorrence  expressed  in  his  sufferings.  But,  if 
Christ  comes  into  the  world,  invoking,  as  it  were,  the  frown  of  God,  and 
undertaking  to  suffer  evil  as  evil,  that  he  may  express  God's  justice,  or  His 
ABHORRENCE  OF  SIN,  then  he  expresses  7iotfiing.  The  very  laws  of  expres- 
sion, if  I  understand  them  rightly,  require  that  suffering  should  be  endured, 
not  as  suffering,  or  as  evil  taken  up  for  the  expression  of  it,  but  that  the  evil 
be  a  necessary  incident  encountered  on  the  leay,  to  some  end  separate  from 
expression some  truth,  benefaction,  or  work  of  love." 

[P.  198-201.]  "In  the  second  and  more  mitigated  class  of  orthodox  opin- 
ions, a  very  important  and  really  true  position  is,  at  last,  reached,  viz  : — that 
the  value  of  Christ's  life  and  death  is  measured  by  what  is  therein  express- 
ed. Only  it  is  needed,  now,  to  go  a  step  farther,  investigating  U'hat  he  ex- 
presses— whether,  possibly,  it  be  not  rather  to  accomplish  these  ends,  and 
that,  too,  icithout  any  imposition  or  endurance  of  evil  in  the  jicnal  form  of 
evil,  any  suffering  or  pain  which  is  tender  taken  for  effect,  as  being  a  direct  ex- 
hibition of  God's  justice,  or  judicial  abhorrence  to  sin." 

"  The  objections  I  have  to  that  more  mitigated  theory,  are  these  : — First, 
it  assumes  that,  as  punishment  expresses  the  abhorretiee  of  God  to  sin,  or 
what  is  the  same,  his  Justice,  he  can  sustain  his  law  and  lay  a  ground  of  for- 
giveness without  punishment,  only  by  some  equivalent  expression  of  abhor- 
rence — an  assumption  that  is  groundless  and  without  consideration,  as  I  may 
cause  to  appear  in  another  place. 

"  Secondly,  this  latter  seems  to  accord  with  the  former  view  in  supposing 
that  Christ  suffers  evil  as  evil,  or  as  a  penal  visitation  of  God's  justice,  only 
doing  it  in  a  less  painful  degree ;  that  is,  suffering  so  much  of  evil  as  will 
suffice,  considering  the  dignity  of  his  person,  to  express  the  same  amount  of 
abhorrence  to  sin,  that  would  be  expressed  by  the  eternal  punishment  of  all 
mankind.  I  confess  my  inability  to  see  how  an  innocent  being  could  ever  be 
set,  even  for  one  moment,  in  an  attitude  of  displeasure  under  God.  If  He 
could  lay  His  frown  for  one  moment  on  the  soul  of  innocence  and  virtue, 
He  must  be  7io  such  being  as  I  have  loved  and.  worshiped.  Much  less  can  I 
imagine  that  He  should  lay  it  on  the  head  of  one  tvhose  nature  is  itself  co- 
equal Deity.  Does  any  one  say  tliat  He  will  do  it  for  public  governmental 
reasons .'  JVo  governmental  reasons,  I  answer,  can  jtistify  even  the  admis- 
sion of  innocence  into  a  participation  of  frowns  and  penal  distributions.  If 
consenting  innocence  says:—'  Let  the  blow  fall  on  me,'  precisely  there  is  it  for 
a  government  to  prove  its  justice,  even  to  the  point  of  sublimity  :  to  reveal  the  essen- 
tial, eternal,  unmitigable  distinction  it  holds  between  innocence  and  sin.,  by  declaring 
that  under  law  and  its  distributions,  it  is  even  impossible  to  suffer  any  com- 
mutation, any  the  least  confusion  of  jolaces. 


17 

of  the  innocent. — [p.  19G.]  It  did  not  please  the  Father  to 
bruise  him,  and  to  put  him  to  grief. — [pp.  228,  229,  230.] 
When  Christ  cried  out  upon  the  cross,  the  Father  had  not  for- 
saken Him. — [p.  230.]     Christ  died  only  incidentally,  with  no 

[P.  200.] — "According  to  the  supposition,  the  problem  here  is  to  produce 
an  expression  of  abhorrence  to  swt,  through  the  sufferings  of  Christ,  in 
PLACE  OF  another,  through  the  sufferings  of  the  guilty.  Now,  the  truth 
of  the  latter  expression  consists  in  the  fact,  that  there  is  an  abhorrence  in 
God  to  be  expressed.  But  there  is  no  such  abliovrencein  God  toward  Christ, 
and,  therefore,  if  the  external  expression  of  Christ's  sufferings  has  no  cor- 
respondent feelings  to  be  expressed,  iv/iere  lies  the  truth  of  the  expression  ?  And 
if  the  frown  of  God  lies  upon  his  soul,  as  we  often  hear,  in  the  garden  and 
on  the  cross,  how  can  the  frown  of  God,  falling  on  the  soul  of  innocence,  express 
any  truth,  or  any  feelings  of  justice  ?" 

[P.  201.]  "  Thirdly,  if  Christ  be  himself,  in  the  highest  and  truest  sense, 
the  Eternal  Life,  God  manifested  in  the  flesh,  then  every  expression  of  justice 
or  abhorrence  to  sin,  -which  is  made  by  his  death,  as  a  mere  endurance  of  evil,  is  in- 
volved in  yet  greater  obscurity  and  confusion." — "  He  is,  in  fact,  theembodiment, 
as  he  is  the  rei^resentation  of  God  and  divine  Government ;  he  must  be  taken, 
in  all  that  he  does,  as  something  which  is  properly  referable  to  God.  No 
theory  of  three  metaphysical  natures,  called  persons,  in  God,  can  at  all  vary 
this  truth.  The  transactions  of  Christ  must  still  be  taken  as  transactions  of 
God.  The  frown,  then,  if  it  be  said  to  be  of  God,  is  quite  as  truly  on  God. 
The  expression  of  justice  or  abliorrence  is  made  by  sufferings  that  are  en- 
dured, not  out  of  the  circle  of  divine  government,  but  in  it.  And  thus  we 
have  a  government  realizing  its  penal  distributions  or  their  equivalents  ; 
that  is,  i^s/ifs/ice,  its  significations  of  abhorrence,  wholly  within  itself  and 
apart  from  all  terms  of  relation,  save  as  the  subjects,  so  called,  are  to  be 
spectators !  Whatever  speculations  we  may  hold,  in  regard  to  modes  of 
expression,  can  we  hold  such  a  view  of  divine  government  without  some 
uncomfprtable  suspicion  of  mistake  in  it .'" 

[P.  196.] — "And  if  the  great  Redeemer,  in  the  excess  of  his  goodness, 
consents,  freely  offers  himself  to  the  Father,  or  to  God,  to  receive  the  penal 
woes,  or  some  sufficient  part  of  the  penal  woes  of  tlie  world,  in  his  own  per- 
son, what  does  it  signify,  when  that  offer  is  accepted,  but  that  God  will  have 
his  modicum  of  suffering  somehow — if  he  lets  the  guilty  go,  will  yet  satis- 
fy himself  out  of  the  innocent .'  In  which  the  divine  government,  instead  of 
clearing  itself,  assumes  the  double  ignominy,  first  of  letting  the  guilty  go,  and 
secondly  of  accepting  the  sufferings  of  innocence." 

[P.  229.] — -'But  this,  it  will  be  apprehended  by  some,  destroys  the  ivhole 
import  of  such  scenes  as  the  agony  and  the  crucifixion.  It  may  require  a  different 
construction  of  these  scenes,  but  I  hope  it  will  not  be  too  hastily  concluded 
that  a  different  construction  robs  them  of  their  sacred  import  and  power.  It 
is  imagined  by  many,  that  what  is  called  '  the  «go»(/' of  Jesus,  was  caus- 
ed by  the  penal  attitude  in  which  he  found  himself  before  the  Father,  and  the 
consequent  sense  of  the  desertion  he  felt." — [p.  230.] — "  It  was  not  that  the  soul 
of  the  sufferer  was  racked,  by  a  sense  of  the  withdrawrnent  of  the  Father.  How  could 
the  Father  withdraw  from  so  great  excellence  and  purity,  under  so  great  a  burden 
of  sorrow  ? — what  end  could  it  serve  thus  tofcdsify  his  character  ? — It  is  also  re- 
presented, by  Luke,  that  an  angel  is  sent  to  strengthen  and  support  him — 
sent  by  the  Father  to  support  him  under  his  own  displeasure !  Sometimes  the  ex- 
clamation, which  he  uttered  afterwards,  on  the  cross,  is  made  to  assist  the 
interpretation  of  the  agony  also — '  My  God !  my  God!  why  hast  thou  forsak- 
en me  !'  But  this  is  only  the  language  of  intense  suffering,  an  interjection, 
so  to  speak,  of  anguish." — "  To  take  this  language  of  passion,  this  common 
outcry  of  distress,  and  hold  it  in  a  cool,  historic,  or  dogmatic  sense,  is  to 
violate  all  dignified  laws  of  interpretation." 
2 


18 

thought  of  a  penal  quality  in  his  death — [pp.  219,  228,  229.] 
or  of  any  divine  abhorrence  of  sin  exhibited  by  sufferings  laid 
upon  his  person. — [pp.  236,  237. J  Everything  done  by  Him 
was  done  for  expression  before  us,  and  thus  for  effect  in  us  : — ■ 
[pp.  236,  237,]  only  that  he  might  enter  into  human  feelings  by 
his  incarnate  charities  and  sufferings,  to  re-engage  the  world's 
love,  and  to  re-unite  the  world,  as  fi-ee,  to  the  Eternal  life — 
[p.  189,]  to  set  before  us  the  value  which  God  puts  upon  law, 
by  the  import  of  His  life  taken  in  the  simple  aspect  of  a  free, 
faithful,  loving  obedience. — [p.  220,  227.]     His  work  was  the 

[Pp.  228, 229.] — "  This  suffering  [of  Christ,]  is  expressive,  because  it  is  m- 
cidental  to  an  effort  to  reveal  the  love  of  God." — "  All  this,  you  perceive, 
without  anything  said  of  a jKiial  quality,  in  the  stiff erings  oi  Christ.  No  evil  is  laid 
upon  him  as  evil,  by  the  Father,  to  be  endtired  rctributively.  He  only  suffers 
the  ills  that  lie  in  his  way,  and  endures  the  violence  that  human  malignity  and  cru- 
elty heap  on  his  head." — [See  this  passage  cited  more  at  length,  under  article 
"  Concerning  the  Law."] 

[Pp.  236,237.] — "  The  effect  depends,  woi  on  any  real  altar-ceremony  in  his 
death,  but  it  depends,  artistically  speaking,  in  the  expressive  power  of  the  fact 
that  the  Incarnate  Word,  appearing  in  humanity,  and  having  a  ministry  for 
the  reconciliation  of  men  to  God,  even  goes  to  such  a  pitch  of  devotion,  as  to  yield 
up  his  life  to  it,  and  allow  the  blood  of  his  mysterious  person  to  redden  our 
polluted  earth." — "  My  doctrine  is  summarily  this — that,  excluding  all 
thoughts  of  a  penal  quality  in  the  life  and  death  of  Christ,  or  of  any  divine  abhor- 
rence to  sin,  exhibited  by  sufferings  laid  upon  his  person — excluding  points  like 
these,  and  regarding  everything  done  by  him  as  done  for  expression  before  us,  and 
thus  for  effect  in  us,  he  does  produce  an  impression  in  our  minds  of  the  essen- 
tial sanctity  of  God's  law  and  character,  which  it  was  needful  to  produce, 
and  without  which  any  proclamation  of  pardon  would  be  dangerous,  any 
attempt  to  subdue  and  reconcile  us  to  God,  ineffectual.  Meantime,  it  may 
comport  some  to  add,  that  he  does  by  implication,  or  inferentially,  express  in 
all  that  he  does  the  profoundest  abhorrence  to  sin ;  for  if,  he  will  endure  so 
much  to  re-sanctify  his  law  and  renew  us  in  the  spirit  of  it,  how  intensely 
gignified  is  the  abhorrence  of  his  nature  to  the  transgression  of  his  law — 
more  intensely  than  it  would  be  by  the  punishment  even  of  us  all !" 

[P.  226,227.] — "  Regard  him  as  coming  under  the  desecrated  law" — " 
then  consider  the  import  of  his  life,  taken  m  the  simple  aspect  of  a  free,  faithful^lov- 
ing,  unfaltering  obedience — obedience  unto  death.  And  then,  if  the  speculative  in- 
stinct rushes  in  to  insist  on  the  absurdity  of  obedience  in  a  being  whose  nature 
is  essential  deity,  let  it  be  enougli  to  reply  that  there  is  no  being  in  the 
universe,  of  whom  obedience  can  be  predicated  in  so  vast  a  sense  as  of  God. 
For  though  God  is  under  no  obligations  to  another.  He  is  yet  under  obligations  to 
goodness  to  devise,  do,  bear,  forbear,  suffer,  all  which  the  conception  or  idea  of  infinite 
goodness  and  love  contains.  He  is  really  under  the  same  law  of  obligation  that  we  were 
under  and  cast  off,  audit  is  the  glory  and  greatness  of  his  nature  that  he  de- 
lights eternally  to  acknowledge  this  law.  Christ  is  the  manifested  life  reveal- 
ing this  everlasting  obedience  of  the  divitie  nature.  Jill  that  he  does  and  suffers  is  but 
an  expression  of  the  homage,  rendered  by  God  himself,  to  that  ichich  we  reject ;  and 
the  only  object  of  his  mission  is  to  bring  us  back  into  a  like  free  obedience  to  the 
same  lovely  requirement.  His  poverty  and  patience,  his  weary,  persecuted 
life  his  agony,  his  cross,  his  death — exclude  from  these  all  thought  of  penal  suffer- 
ing or  vindictive  chastisement,  regard  him  simi:)ly  as  thus  supporting  the 
CALL  OF  DUTY,  and  signifying  to  mankind  the  self-renouncing  and  sublime 
obedience  of  the  divine  nature." 


19 

fulfilment  of  His  own  eternal  obligation — in  which,  by 
simply  supporting  the  call  of  duty,  and  signifying  to  man* 
kind  the  self-renouncing  and  sublime  obedience  of  the  di- 
vine nature,  [p.  227,]  He  aimed  to  bring  us,  by  this  example, 
back  into  a  like  free  obedience  to  the  same  lovely  requirement ; 
and  incidentally  he  died  rather  than  depart  from  this  woi-k. 
-[201.] 

VI. — Justification    by    Faith. 

1.  The  Object  of  the  Faith. 

2.  Nature  of  the  Justification. 

3.  The  Ground  of  Justification. 

1.  The  OBJECT  of  the  faith  by  which  the  sinner  is  justified,  is 
not  Christ  as  the  Redeemer  whose  blood  was  really  shed  for 
the  remission  of  sins  ;  for  no  such  sacrifice  was  rendered,  and 
none  was  needed,  in  order  that  God  might  be  just,  and  the 
justifier  of  the  sinner.  If  God  had  accepted  such  a  sacrifice, 
it  would  have  been  both  unjust  and  absurd,  and  a  sufficient 
ground  for  rejecting  him  as  the  God  of  our  love  and  worship 
[pp.  199-201.]     [See  under  Atonement.] 

2.  The  sinner  has  no  remission  of  sins  through  the  merits 
of  Christ's  atoning  blood  :  nor  is  Justification  "  An  act  of 
God's  free  grace,  wherein  he  pardoneth  all  our  sins,  and  ac- 
cepteth  us  as  righteous  in  his  sight,  only  for  the  righteousness 
of  Christ  imputed  to  us  and  received  by  faith  alone  ;"  nor  for 
any  consideration  based  on  any  vicarious  or  atoning  sacrifice 
of  Christ.  If  the  sinner  believes  in  such  a  sacrifice,  and  rests 
his  soul  upon  it,  this  is  not  believing  and  resting  in  the  truth, 
but  in  error  [p.  268].  The  sinner  is  to  understand  by  the  suf- 
ferings and  death  of  Christ,  that  God  had  proposed  to  express — 
not  penalty  or  abhorrence  of  sin,  but — only  his  love,  and  what 
God  will  do,  without  punishment  and  without  the  expression 
of  penalty  or  abhorrence,  for  the  practical  establishment  of 
his  law.     [See  under  Atonement.]     Coming  with  this  under- 

[P.  268.]—  "  First,  we  have  what  may  be  called  the  Protestant  form,  which 
takes  the  ritualistic  side  of  tlie  Gospel,  the  objective  side,  turns  it  into  dog- 
ma, and  repeats  it  as  a  theoretic  or  theologic  truth.  And  then  though  it 
be  no  longer  a  truth,  the/brm  of  a  truth,  and  so  far  a  divine  power  lingers  in 
it." 


20 

standing  to  the  spectacle  of  Christ's  life  and  incidental  death, 
the  sinner  is  to  take  courage  and  receive  assurance,  being  con- 
vinced that  his  terrors  of  the  condemning  sentence  of  the  law 
are  groundless,  and  that  visibly  God  is  not  the  implacable 
avenger  his  guilty  fears  had  painted  [pp.  213-21GJ.  This 
belief  is  saving  faith  [p.  214].  This  assurance  is  Justifica- 
tion [p.  214]. 

[P.  213-216.]  "  An  indescribable  dread  of  evil  still  overhangs  the  human 
spirit.  The  being  is  haunted  by  shadows  of  wrath  and  tries  all  painful  me- 
thods of  self  pacification.  Vigils,  pilgrimages,  sacrifices,  tortures,  notliing 
is  too  painful  or  wearisome  that  promises  to  ease  the  guilt  of  the  mind. 
Without  any  speculations  about  justification,  mankind  refuse  to  jnstify  them- 
selves. A  kind  of  despair  fills  the  heart  of  the  race.  They  have  no  cour- 
age. Whether  they  know  God  or  not,  they  know  themselves,  and  they  sen- 
tence themselves  to  death.  If  they  have  only  some  obscure  notions  of  a  di- 
vine Being,  then  they  dread  the  full  discovery  of  him.  If  he  lurks  in  their 
gods,  they  fear  lest  their  gods  should  visit  them  in  vcngeslnce,  or  plague 
them  by  some  kind  of  mischief  The  sky  is  full  of  wrathful  powers,  and  the 
deep  ground  also  is  full.  Their  guilty  soul  peoples  the  world  with  venge- 
ful images  of  its  own  creation." 

[P.  214.]  "  And  here,  now,  if  we  desire  to  find  it,  is  the  true  idea  of  Christian 
Justification.  We  discover  what  it  is  by  the  want  of  it.  Justification  is  that 
which  will  give  confidence,  again,  to  guilty  minds  ;  that  which  will  assure  the 
base  and  humiliated  soul  of  the  world,  chase  away  the  detyions  of  wrath  and 
despair  it  has  evoked,  and  help  it  to  return  to  God  in  courage,  whispering  still 

to  itself — soul  be  of  good  cheer,  thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee." "  In  short 

he  [Christ,]  lives  confidence  into  the  world.  Apart  from  all  theologic  theories, 
we  knotc,  we  see  with  our  eyes,  that  God  will  justify  us  and  give  us  still  his 
peace.  And  then,  when  we  truly  come  nnto  him,  believing  that  Christ  the  Word 
is  He,  when  forsaking  all  things  for  him,  we  embrace  him  as  our  life,  then  are 
we  practically  juslijied.  It  is  impossible  for  us  to  fear.  No  guilt  of  the  past 
can  disturb  us  ;  a  peace  that  passeth  understanding  fills  our  nature.  Being 
justified  Ly  faith,  we  have  peace  with  God  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

"  Or,  if  we  advert,  in  this  connection,  to  the  sufferings  and  death  of  Christ, 
we  shall  see  how  these,  without  the  imijutatiou  of  any  penal  quality  or  frown 
of  God  upon  his  person,  have  a  special  efficacy  in  fortifying  our  assurance, 
or  hope  of  justification  with  God.  Dismiss  all  speculation  about  the  mode,  pos- 
sibility, interior  reality  of  this  suffering  ;  understand  that  God,  having  propos- 
ed,.in  this  manner,  to  express  his  love,  all  logical,  theological,  ontological,  phy- 
sioioi-ical  questions  are,  by  the  supposition,  out  of  place.  Come,  then,  to  the 
spectacle  of  Christ's  suffering  life  and  death,  as  to  amystery  wholly  transcend- 
ent, save  in  what  it  expresses  of  Divine  feeling.  Call  what  oii\\is  J  eel  in  g  you 
receive,  the  reality — all  else  the  machina  Dei  for  the  expression  of  this.  With 
deepest  reverence  of  soul,  approach  that  most  mysterious  sacrament  of  love, 
the  ao-ony  of  Jesus  ;  note  the  patience  of  his  trial,  the  meekness  of  his  sub- 
mission to  injustice,  and  the  malignant  passions  of  his  enemies  ;  behold  the 
creation  itself  darkening  and  shuddering  with  a  horror  of  sensibility  at  the 
scene  transpiring  in  his  death  ;  hear  the  cry  of  the  crucified — "  Father,  for- 
give them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do  ;"  then  regard  the  life  that  was 
manifested,  dropping  into  cessation,  and  thereby  signifying  the  deposite  of 
itself  in  the  bosom  of  that  malign  world  to  whose  enmity  it  is  yielded, — Avho, 
what  man  of  our  race  beholding  this  strange  history  of  the  Word,  will  not 
feel  a  new  courage  enter  into  his  soul  ?  Visibly,  God  is  not  the  implaca- 
ble AVENGER  HIS  GUILTY  FEARS  HAD  PAINTED.  But  He  is  a  friend,  he  is  love 
And  so  great  is  this  change,  apart  from  all  theology,  that  I  seem  even  to  see 


21 

3.  The  ground  of  Justification  is  not  the  sacrifice  which 
Christ  has  made  to  answer  the  condemning  sentence  of  the 
law,  but  it  is  the  righteousness  which  is  prepared  in  us  [pp. 
254-258],     Christ  is  not   really  our  sacrifice  or  atonement, 

anotlier  character  produced  by  it  in  the  Christian  nations.  They  dare  to  hope. 
God  is  closer  to  them,  and  in  a  way  to  inspire  courage.  They  are  notimth- 
ered,  humiliated  even  to  baseness,  tinker  those  guilty  and  abject  fears,  that  take 
away  at  last  the  spirit  of  other  nations.  It  is  not  that  they  have  all  a  theory 
of  Justijication  by  faith,  but  that  their  current  conceptions  of  God  are  such 
as  the  history  of  Jesus,  the  suffering  Redeemer,  has  imparted.  They  have  a 
feeling  of  something  like  Justification,  even  if  they  never  heard  of  it — a  feel- 
ing, which,  if  it  were  to  vent  itself  in  language,  would  say — Therefore  ii'e  are 
freely  Justified  by  grace.  It  is  not  that  the  suffering  appeases  God,  but  that 
it  expresses  God — displays,  in  open  history,  the  unconquerable  love  of  God  s 
Heart." 

[P.  254.]  "  The  moral  propriety,  then,  or  possibility,  nay,  in  one  view, 
THE  GROUNP  OF  JUSTIFICATION,  is  subjectively  prepared  in  us;  viz.,  in  a 
state  or  impression,  a  sense  of  the  sacredncss  of  law,  produced  in  us,  by 
Christ's  life  and  death.  But  we  cannot  think  of  it  in  this  artificial  way ; 
most  persons  could  make  nothing  of  it.  We  must  transfer  this  subjective  state 
or  impression,  this  ground  of  justification,  and  produce  it  outwardly,  if 
possible,  in  some  objective  form  ;  as  if  it  had  some  effect  on  the  law  or  on  God. 
The  Jew  had  done  the  same  before  us,  and  we  follow  him  ;  representing 
Christ  as  our  sacrifice ,  sin-offering,  atonement,  or  sprinkling  of  blood.  Now 
in  all  these  terms,  we  represent  a  work  as  done  outwardly  for  us,  which  is 
really  done  in  us,  and  through  impressions  prepared  in  us,  but  the  more  ade- 
quately and  truly  still,  for  the  reason  that  we  have  it  in  mystic  forms  before 
us.  These  forms  are  the  objective  equivalent  of  our  subjective  impressions. 
Indeed,  our  impressions  have  their  life  and  power  in  and  under  these  forms. 
Neither  let  it  be  imagined  that  we  only  happen  to  seize  upon  these  images  of 
sacrifice,  atonement,  and  blood,  because  they  arc  at  hand.  Tliej'  are  prepar- 
ed, as  God's  form  of  art,  for  the  representation  of  Christ  and  his  work  ;  and 
if  we  refuse  to  let  him  pass  into  this  form,  we  have  no  mold  of  thought  that 
can  fitly  represent  him.  And  when  he  is  thus  represented,  we  are  to  under- 
stand that  he  is  our  sacrifice  and  atonement,  that  by  his  blood  we  have  re- 
mission, not  in  any  speculative  sense,  but  as  in  art.  AVe  might  as  well  think 
to  come  at  the  statue  of  Aristides  speculatively,  interpreting  its  power  by 
geometric  demonstrations,  instead  of  giving  our  heart  to  the  expression  of 
integrity  in  the  form,  as  to  be  scheming  ami  dogmatizing  over  these  words 
atonement,  sin-offering,  sacrifice,  and  blood,  which  are  the  divine  form  of 
Christianity. 

[P.  255.]  "  It  is  only  another  aspect  of  the  same  truth,  when  Christ  is  repre- 
sented, objectively,  as  our  righteousness.  As  the  sacred  blood,  yielded  for  sin, 
stood  in  the  place  of  a  righteousness,  in  virtue  of  tlie  impressions  produced  by 
it,  so  also  does  Christ;  and  as  the  oSering^\'ns  n  liiurgic  exercise  of J'aith  and 
penitence,  so  likewise  Christ  is  a  power  to  regenerate  character  and  restore  us 
to  righteousness  of  life.  What,  then,  shall  we  call  him,  if  not  our  righteousness  ; 
tr.ansferring,  again,  what  is  only  subjective,  in  us,  and  beholding  it  in  its 
objective  source — that  is,  in  the  form  of  divine  art  and  cxpres.sion,  by  which  it 
is  wrought  ?  This  is  the  true  attitude  o/ faith  ;  for  if,  in  the  utmost  sim- 
plicity, we  thus  believe  in  liim,  if  we  take  him,  objectively,  as  a  stock  of 
righteousness  for  us,  and  hang  ourselves  upon  him  lor  supply,  we  can 
scarcely  fail  to  have  his  life  and  character  ingrafted  in  us.  We  may  take  his 
obedience  as  accruing  to  our  benefit — we  may  see  ottr  righteousness  in  him, 
just  as  we  say  we  see  our  pity  in  things  that  we  say  are  pitiful.  If  we  go 
farther,  if  we  speak  of  his  righteousness  as  imputed  to  us,  it  will  not  be  ill. 


22 

nor  have  we  b}  his  blood  any  real  remission  of  sins ;  these 
are  only  terms,  as  in  art,  transferring  objectively  to  Christ, 
the  ground  of  justification,  which  is  really  subjective  in  us; 
the  effect  of  his  death  being  not  upon  the  sentence  of  the  law, 

in  case  we  hold  the  representation  as  in  art^  and  not  as  a  dialectic  or  dogmatic  state- 
ment. 

"  Or,  adverting  to  the  aifecting  truth  that  Christ  has  come  between  us  and 
our  sins  in  his  death,  we  shall  see  our  sins  transferred  to  him,  and  regard  him 
as  loading  himself  with  our  evils.  And  then,  as  if  we  had  put  our  sins  upon 
his  head,  we  shall  say  that  he  bears  our  sins,  suifers  the  just  for  the  unjust,  is 
made  a  curse  for  us.  All  those  terms  of  vicarious  import,  that  were  generat- 
ed under  the  ritual  sacrifice,  will  be  applied  over  to  him,  and  we  shall  hold 
him  by  our  ftxith,  as  the  victim  substituted  for  our  sins.  And  so,  with  the 
humblest  and  most  subduing  confessions,  we  shall  deposit  our  soul  tenderly 
and  gratefully  in  his  mercy. 

[256,7,  8.]  "  Or  we  may  take  the  general  doctrine  affirmed  as  the  subjec- 
tive verity  of  the  Gospel,  viz.,  that  God  is  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world 
unto  himself.  Then  all  the  sacrificial  terms,  that  represent  jjacification  loith  God, 
will  come  into  application  at  once  ;  Christ  will  now  be  called  our  priest  ans- 
wering for  us,  our  sacrifice,  passover,  lamb,  blood  of  sprinkling.  Here,  too,  the 
word  propitiation,  as  used  (1  John  ii.  2,) — a  different  word,  in  the  original, 
from  that  which  we  found  in  the  third  chapter  of  the  epistle  to  the  Romans — 
will  get  its  proper  objective  sense.  Viewed  thus  objectively,  Christ  will  be 
a  propitiation,  a  piacular,  expiatory,  vicarious  offering,  and,  embracing  him 
in  this  altar  form,  there  will  be  a  simplicity  in  our  moral  attitude,  such  as 
will  favor  the  transforming  and  reconciling  power  of  his  life,  as  no  attempt 
to  apply  him  artificially  and  reflectively  would  do — therefore  with  a  more 
certain  and  deeper  effect. 

"  Or,  if  we  are  occupied  more  especially  with  the  desire  of  purification,  or 
with  present,  actual  deliverance  from  evil,  and  the  new  purity  and  cleanness 
of  our  heart  before  God,  we  shall  sjiea'f  of  Christ  as  a  lustral  offering  that  re- 
moves our  defilement,  and  declare  that  the  blood  of  Christ  cleanseth  from  all 
sin.  All  things,  we  shall  soj/,  in  our  deep  gratitude,  are  purged  with  blood, 
and  without  shedding  of  blood  there  is  no  remission. 

"  You  perceive,  in  this  manner,  and  as  a  result  of  our  experiment,  that  as 
soon  as  we  undertake  to  throw  the  elements  of  our  subjective  doctrine  into  an 
objective  representation,  it  passes  immediately  into  the  view  commonly  desig- 
nated by  the  phrase  vicarious  atonement,  only  it  rather  becomes  a  vicarious 
religion.  And  thus,  after  all,  it  proves  itself  to  be  identical,  at  the  root,  icith 
the  common  Protestant  doctrine — identical,  I  mean,  not  in  any  rigid  and  ex- 
act sense,  but  in  such  a  sense  that  one  is  a  more  didactic  and  reflective,  the 
other  a  more  artistic  representation  of  the  same  subject  matter.     There  is  no 

conflict,  UNTIL  WE  BEGIN  TO  ASSERT  THE  FORMER  AS    THE    ONLY    TRUTH    OF 

THE  G6spEL,  or  to  work  up  the  latter  by  itself,  into  a  speculative  system  of 
dogma,  or  of  moral  government.  If  we  say  that  Christ  is  here,  reconciling 
men  to  God,  it  is,  for  just  that  reason,  necessary  to  have  a  way  of  representing 
that  God  is  conciliated  toward  us.  If  we  say  that  Christ  is  a  power,  to 
quicken  us  into  newness  of  life,  and  bring  us  out  of  the  bondage  we  are 
under  to  evil,  for  just  that  reason  do  we  need  to  speak  of  the  remission  of 
sins  obtained  by  his  blood ;  for  the  two  seem  to  be  only  different  forms  of  one 
and  the  same  truth,  and  are  often  run  together  in  the  Scriptures — as  when 
the  blood  of  Christ,  '  who  offered  himself  without  spot  to  God,' is  said  to 
'  purge  the  conscience  from  dead  works,  to  serve  the  living  God.'  The  two 
views  are  not  logically  or  theologically  equivalent,  but  they  are  not  the  less 
really  so  on  that  account.  An  objective  religion,  that  shall  stand  before  me, 
and  be  operated  or  operative  for  me,  excluding  all  subjective  reference  of 
thought,  must  take  such  forms,  most  obviously,  as  are  no  logical  equivalents 


23 

but  upon  us,  making  impressions  on  us,  and  working  charac- 
ter in  us  [p.  255].  So  we  call  Christ  our  righteousness, 
transferring  to  Christ,  as  in  art,  what  is  only  subjective  in  us ; 
the  righteousness  by  which  we  are  justified  being  not  in  Christ, 
but  in  us  [p.  255].  We  only  see  our  own  righteousness  in  him, 
just  as  we  see  our  own  pity  in  things  that  we  call  pitiful  [p. 
255].  In  no  other  sense  or  manner  do  we  see  our  sins  trans- 
ferred to  Christ,  or  regard  him  as  loading  himself  with  our 
evils.  As  if  we  had  put  our  sins  on  his  head,  we  say  that  he 
bears  our  sins — suffers  the  just  for  the  unjust.  It  is  not  so  ; 
he  does  not  bear  our  sins,  nor  suffer  vicariously  the  just  for 
the  unjust ;  but  we  are  justified  by  actual  righteousness 
wrought  in  us  through  the  impressions  of  the  sacredness  of 
law  and  of  the  love  of  God,  made  upon  us  by  the  manifesta- 
tion of  the  same  in  the  life  and  death  of  Christ  [pp.  255,  2G6]. 

VII. — Objective  Forms  of  Subjective  Truths. 

The  objective  form,  if  regarded  as  the  truth,  is  not  true  [pp. 
257, 268],  the  representation  bearing  no  true  correspondency  to 

of  the  same,  considered  as  addressing  and  describing  our  internal  states :  for, 
by  the  supposition,  an  objective  artistic  poiv/r  is  substituted  for  those  methods 
of  address  which  appeal  to  consideration,  reflection,  and  self-regulation." — "  It 
is  the  Divine  Form  of  Christianity,  in  distinction  from  all  others,  and  is, 
in  that  view,  substantial  to  it,  or  consubstantial  with  it.  It  is,  in  ftict,  a 
Divine  Ritual  for  the  working  of  the  world's  mind." — "  The  Christ  must  become 
a  religion  fur  the  soul  aud  before  it :  therefore,  a  Rite  or  Liturgy  for  the 
world's  feeling, — otherwise- Christianity  were  incomplete,  or  imperfect." 

[P.  266.]  "If  the  soul,  then,  is  ever  to  get  her  health  and  freedom  in 
goodness,  she  must  have  the  gospel,  not  as  a  doctrine  only,  but  as  rite  before 
her,  a  righteonsness ,  a  ransom,  a  sacrifice,  a  lamb  slain,  a  blood  offered  for  her 
cleansing  before  Jehovah's  altar.  Then,  reclining  her  broken  heart  on  this, 
calling  it  her  religion — hers  by  faith — she  receives  a  grace  broadei*  than 
consciousness,  loses  herself  in  a  love  that  is  not  imparted  in  the  molds  of  mere 
self-culture,  and  without  making  folly  of  Christ  by  her  own  vain  self-appli- 
cations, he  is  made  unto  her  wisdom,  righteousness,  sanctification,  and  re- 
demption." 

[P.  257.]  "  There  is  no  conflict"  [between  this  doctrine  and  "  the  common 
Protestant  doctrine"]  "  until  we  begin  to  assert  the"  [latter]  "  as  the  only 
truth  of  the  Gospel."     [See  the  pasage  under  Justification.] 

[P.  208.]  "  First,  we  have  what  may  be  called  the  Protestant  form,  yi\nch. 
takes  the  ritualistic  side  of  the  Gospel,  Mf'  objective  side,  inrns,  it  into  dogma, 
and  re-asserts  it  as  a  theoretic  or  theologic  truth.  And  then,  though  it  be 
NO  LoxGER  A  TRUTH,  the ./o/v/i  of  a  truth,  and,  so  far,  a  divine  power  lingers 
in  it.  I  say  a  divine  power;  for  this  holy  form  of  sacrifice  is  no  child  of  hu- 
man art  or  reason,  but  the  body  prepared  of  God  to  be  tlie  vehicle  of  his  love 
to  men.  But,  alas !  the  Protestant  world  have  not  been  able  to  content  tliera- 
selves  in  it,  or  to  think  it  sufficiently  wise,  till  they  have  changed  it  into 


24 

any  thing  real.  It  is  only  a  form,  or  representation,  or  liturgy, 
by  which  impressions  are  produced  in  us.  Thus,  there  being 
no  real  sacrifice,  nor  any  real  remission  of  sin  as  the  effect  of 
sacrifice,  and  the  atonement  being  no  propitiation  to  the  di- 
vine justice,  but  a  simple  at-one-ment — having  all  its  effect 
upon  us  [see  pp.  236,  237,  under  Atonement]  not  by  any  real 
altar  ceremony,  but  only  by  an  artistic  display — a  liturgic 
form  [see  pp.  252-255,  under  Atonement]  for  an  effect  in  the 
direct  manner  of  art, — to  turn  these  representations  into  dog- 
ma, and  represent  them  as  realities,  is  to  represent  as  truth 
that  which  is  not  true  [pp.  268,  257] ;  and  the  Protestant 
world,  who  have  taught  that  these  representations  of  atone- 
ment and  remission  by  the  blood  of  Christ  have  a  true  corres- 
pondence with  any  thing  real,  and  so  are  the  truth,  have  done 
what  they  could  to  set  themselves  between  God's  wisdom  and 
man's  want  [p.  268.]  Howbeit,  there  are  beams  of  light  yet 
shining  by  them,  and  some,  it  is  to  be  trusted,  shine  through  - 
inasmuch  as  what  they  set  forth  as  truth,  though  no  truth,  is 
yet  a  Divine  Form — the  body  prepared  by  God  to  be  the  ve- 
hicle of  his  love  to  men.  The  particle  of  truth  which  Pro- 
testants hold,  is  no  reason  for  their  contending  about  the  faith, 
either  with  Papists  or  Unitarians,  who  also  hold  their  particle  : 
— on  the  basis  of  this  doctrine  of  objective  forms  of  subjective 
truths,  Protestants,  Romanists,  apd  Unitarians,  may  all  unite? 
universalize  their  feelings,  and  become  brothers  [pp.  269-270]. 

dogma,  and  made  it  hianan ;  in  ■which,  they  have  done  what  they  could  to  set 
themselves  between  God's  wisdom  and  man's  want.  Still  tliere  are  beams  of 
light  shining  by  them,  and  some,  I  trust,  shine  through." 

[P.  269.]  "  Secondly,  on  the  left  of  this  Protestant  form,  Tve  have  the 
speculative  or  philosophic  form."—"  Under  this,  as  one  of  its  varieties,  the 
Unitarian  doctrine  is  included.  Nor  is  there  any  doubt  that  we  declare 
a  great  and  real  truth,  -when  we  say  that  the  reconciliation  of  man  to  God  is 
the  sole  object  of  Christ's  mission." — "  Reason  is  not  confused  and  baitled 
here,  as  in  the  Protestant  dogma,  but  the  altar  of  self-renunciation  andfaitli, 
she  has  taken  down." 

P.  270.]  "  Thirdly,  on  the  right  hand  of  the  Protestant  view,  we  have  the 
Eomish  form,  the  form  of  the  mass.  Here  the  ritual,  objective  view,  is  all  in 
all — nay,  somewhat  more  than  all." — "  We  deal  with  blood,  not  as  a  symbol 
to  faith  and  feeling,  but  as  a  real  and  miraculous  entity.  But  here,  again,  a 
light  will  sometimes  stream  by  the  miracle,  into  the  worshipper's  heart — gen- 
uine light  from  Christ  our  peace,  and  the  Lamb  that  taketh  away  our  sin." — 
"  Seeing  thus  how  at-one-ment  and  atonement  and  thi:  mass,  all,  lie  about 
the  Christian  truth,  receiving  something  from  it  which  belongs  to  its  verity,  re- 
jecting much  that  is  essential  to  its  value  and  power,  is  it  better  to  busy  our- 


25 


VIII. — Christianity  Esoteric  and  Exoteric. 

There  may  be  a  true  Christian  experience  when  one  rejects 
the  altar  form,  both  as  a  truth  and  as  a  form  without  truth  [p- 
264,  265].  It  will  add  greatly  to  the  comfort  and  true  under- 
standing of  the  preacher,  if  he  has  in  liis  mind  this  solution  oi' 
the  form,  viz.,  that  it  is  art  and  not  truth  [p.  271],  and  prob- 
ably the  philosophic  or  subjective  view  (which  rejects  the 
doctrine  of  vicarious  atonement  as  a  reality,  and  views  it  as 
a  liturgy  or  form  of  art)  may  be  allowed  to  come  into  a  some- 
what more  prevalent  use  among  a  cultivated,  philosophic  peo- 
ple [p.  271],  and  in  a  philosophic  age  of  the  world.  Yet  such 
people  will,  from  their  infirmities,  continue  to  have  some  need 
of  the  sacrificial  or  ritual  view  [p.  271] ;  and  the  rude  masses 
would  be  much  injured  by  the  discovery  that  these  represent- 
ations are  not  realities ;  and  would  make  a  sad  figure  in  ap- 
plying a  gospel  of  philosophic  causes  to  their  own  nature,  for 
they  hardly  know  as  yet  that  they  have  a  nature   [p.  267]. 

selves  for  tlie  next  eighteen  centuries,  in  quarreling,  eacla  for  the  particle  of 
truth  lie  lias,  because  it  is  a  particle,  or,  to  come  back,  in  sbame  and  sorrow, 
and  receive  enough  of  God's  truth  to  enlarge  our  consciousness,  iiniversalize 
our  feelings,  and  make  us  brothers  :" 

[P.  264.]  "  I  do  not  say  here,  it  will  be  observed,  that  no  one  can  have  a 
true  Christian  experience,  who  does  not  find  it  in  the  embrace  of  Christ  as  a 
sacrifice,  or  a  vicarious  religion ;  I  only  affirm  that  no  one  ever  becomes  a 
true  Christian  man,  who  docs  not  rest  liimself  in  God,  or  give  himself  over  to 
God  in  objective  faith  and  devotion,  somehow.  He  may  do  this,  regarding 
simply  the  essential  truth  and  goodness  of  God  as  revealed  in  .Jesus  Christ!" — 
"  And  here  it  is  that  the  objective  viciv  of  Christ  holds  a  connection  so  profound, 
with  all  that  is  freest,  most  unselfish,  and  most  elevated  in  Christian  experi- 
ence.    There  may  be  a  Christian  experience  where  it  is  rejected."  [p.  265  ] 

[P.  271.]  "  An  interesting  question  remains,  Avhich  I  can  only  reply  to 
just  far  enough  to  save  from  misapprehension,  viz.,  how  ought  Christ  to  be 
preached  ?  Not,  certainly,  as  a  theory,  nor  in  the  half  scholastic  manner  in 
which  1  have  here  cxhiljited  the  Christian  doctrine.  I  only  think  it  will  add 
greatly  to  the  comfort  and  true  self -understanding  of  \\\q  jjreacher  in  his  works, 
ifhe  has,  m/j(soR'>i»imrf, some  such  solution  as  this.  Meantime,  he  is  to  preach 
much  as  the  Scriptures  themselves  speak,  blending  the  two  views  of  Christ 
together.  Sometimes  he  will  be  more  in  one,  and  sometimes  more  in  the  other. 
Probably  the  philosophic,  or  subjective  viciv,  may  be  allowed  to  come  info  a  somewhat 
more  prevalent  use  among  a  cultivated,  philosophic  jjcoplc,  and  in  a  philosophic  age  of 
the  world.  But  it  must  never  exclude  and  displace  the  sacrificial  or  ritual  view ; 
for  even  the  Christian  philosopher  himself  will  need  often  to  go  back  to  this 
lioly  altar  of  feeling,*  and  hang  there,  trusting  in  Christ's  offering;  there  to 
rest  himself  in  the  quietness  of  faith,  getting  away  from  his  care  and  reflec- 
tion, and  his  troublesome  self-culture,  to  be  cared  for  and  clothed  with  a 
righteousness  not  his  own." 

P.  2G7.]     "  I  might  speak  also" — "  of  the  sad  figure  that  would  be  made  by 


26 

They  want  an  altar,  and  at  least  a  form  of  Christ's  blood 
sprinkled  on  it ;  he  must,  though  not  in  reality,  yet  in  their 
apprehension,  bear  their  sins  for  them.  He  must  be  a  stock 
of  righteousness  before  them,  and  be,  in  iact,  their  religion- 
They,  then,  taking  him  by  faith  to  he  all  this  before  and  for 
them,  though,  in  reality,  he  is  nothing  of  all  this  at  all, — the 
Divine  Art  hidden  in  it  transforms  their  inner  life,  in  the  im- 
mediate and  absolute  manner  of  art ;  and  seeing  now  their 
new  peace,  not  in  themselves,  where  it  is,  but  in  God  (where 
it  is  not,)  they  rejoice  that  God  is  reconciled,  and  his  anger 
smoothed  away  ;  being  equally  under  an  illusion  in  supposing 
this  last  to  be  true  as  the  first  [p.  267;  see  213-216,  under 
Justification]. 

the  rude  masses  of  the  worlil,  in  applying  a  gospel  of  philosophic  causes  to  their 
own  nature;  for  they  hardly  know,  as  yet,  that  they  have  a  nature.  How 
manifest  is  it  that  they  want  an  altar,  set  up  before  them,  and  if  they  cannot 
quite  see  the  blood  of  Christ  sprinkled  on  it,  they  must  have  it  as  a  Form  in 
their  souls  ;  he  must  be  a  stock  of  righteovisness  before  them ;  he  must  bear 
their  sins  for  them,  and  be,  in  fact,  their  religion.  Then,  taking  him,  by  faith, 
TO  BE  all  this  before  and  for  them,  the  Divine  Art  hid  in  it,  transforms  their 
inner  life,  in  the  immediate,  absolute  manner  of  art ;  and  seeing  now  their  new 
peace,  7iot  in  themselves,  where  it  is,  but  in  God,  they  rejoice  that  God  is  re- 
conciled, and  his  anger  smoothed  away. 

"However,  there  is  no  such  difference  of  class  among  men,  that  the  most 
cultivated  and  wisest  disciple  will  not  often  need,  and  as  often  rejoice,  to  get 
away  from  all  self-handling  and  self-cherishing  cares." — "  The  mind  becomes 
wearied  and  lost  in  its  own  mazes,  discouraged  and  crushed  by  its  frequent 
defeats,  and  virtue  itself,  being  only  a  conscious  tug  of  exertion,  takes  a  look 
as  unbeautiful  as  the  life  is  unhappy.  Therefore  we  need,  all  alike,  some  objec- 
tive religion ;  to  come  and  hang  ourselves  upon  the  altar  of  sacrifice  sprink- 
led by  the  blood  of  Jesus ;  to  enter  into  the  Holiest  set  open  by  his  death ;  to 
quiet  our  soul  in  his  peace,  clothe  it  in  his  righteousness,  and  trust  him  as 
the  Lamb  of  God  that  taketh  away  our  sin.  In  these  simple,  unselfish,  un- 
reflective  exercises,  we  shall  make  our  closest  approach  to  God." 

REMARKS. 

According  to  this  scheme,  we  are  both  justified  and  sanc- 
tified, by  embracing  as  truth  that  which  is  no  truth ;  and 
though  the  more  "  cultivated  and  philosophic  "  might  become 
so  even  under  a  knowledge  of  the  truth,  yet  it  is  essential  to 
the  "  rude  masses  "  to  be  thus  deluded.  Accordingly,  God 
prepares  a  Divine  Form,  a  form  not  corresponding  to  the 
reality  of  things,  and  which,  regarded  as  the  truth,  is  not  true, 
by  which,  through  an  illusion — not  to  say  deception — prac- 
tised on  their  understandings,  he  moves  their  feelings  to  love 


27 

and  righteousness.  This  illusion  is  far  more  effectual  than 
truth ;  indeed  the  rude  masses  would  have  made  a  sad  figure 
with  the  truth;  and  even  the  cultivated  and  philosophic  stand 
in  much  need  of  the  illusion.  God  therefore  persuades  men 
that  Christ  died  to  atone  for  their  sins  to  his  offended  justice 
and  to  his  injured  law ;  but  this  is  not  so.  He  makes  them 
believe  that  Christ  is  the  propitiation  for  their  sins,  and  that 
Christ  is  their  righteousness  ;  but  it  is  not  so.  Taught  to  ap- 
ply to  Christ  "all  these  terms  of  vicarious  import"  [pp.  255- 
258],  they  hold  him  by  faith  as  the  victim  substituted  i'or  their 
sins  [p.  267].  Holding  thus,  by  faith,  to  an  untruth,  under 
the  illusion — or  delusion — that  Christ  bears  their  sins  [p.  256] » 
suffers  the  just  for  the  unjust,  is  made  a  curse  for  them — 
"  with  the  humblest  and  most  subduing  confessions,  they  de- 
posit.their  souls  tenderly  and  gratefully  in  the  Divine  mercy  " 
[p.  256].  Thus  by  Divinely  prepared  Forms,  or  Liturgic  exer- 
cises wrought  before  them,  and  by  Divine  Art  hid  in  forms  de- 
void of  truth,  God  converts  and  sanctifies  the  soul. 

And,  what  is  even  more  remarkable  in  this  scheme  is,  that 
Giod  so  deludes  men  by  representations  of  vicarious  suffering, 
which  have  in  them,  "when  speculatively  regarded,"  that 
which  is  "  repugnant  to  the  most  saa-ed  instincts  or  sentiments 
of  our  moral  nature,''  and  which  "dissolves  itself  at  the  first 
approach  of  rational  inquiry''  [p.  203];  and  by  which,  if  we 
once  regard  these  representations  as  true,  he  forfeits  our  es- 
teem as  the  God  of  our  love  and  worship  [p.  199]. 

Our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  says,  "  Sanctify  them  through  thy 
truth  :  thy  loord  is  truth."  No,  says  this  book,  sanctify  them 
through  illusions.  It  will  not  do  for  the  rude  masses  to  know 
the  truth.  Besides,  "  thy  word  " — in  its  representations  of  vi- 
carious atonement,  and  as  it  is  necessary  to  be  understood  by 
the  rude  masses — is  not  "  truth." 

The  Savior  says,  "  Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth 
shall  make  you  free."  No,  says  this  book ;  truth  cannot  be 
known ;  language  is  inadequate  to  allow  of  any  written  and 
external  revelation  which  shall  truly  and  intelligibly  declare 
the  mind  and  will  of  God  to  his  creatures.     What  we  want 


28 

is  not  truth,  but  iinprcssions  from  liturgies  and  forms  of  art. 
Doctrinal  statements  of  truth  are  mere  dogma,  fraught  with 
error  and  mischief.  Ye  shall  not  know  the  truth ;  ye  shall 
receive  impressions  from  Forms  of  Art,  and  embrace  b}^  faith 
things  which  are  not  truths;  and  error  "  shall  make  you  free." 
We  had  indeed  read  of  some,  that  God  should  send  them 
"  strong  delusion  that  they  might  believe  a  lie ;  that  they  all 
might  be  damned  who  believe  not  the  truth  ;"  and  that  for  the 
very  reason,  that  they  "  received  not  the  love  of  the  truth, 
that  they  might  be  saved."'  But  according  to  this  theory,  God 
has  beforehand  prepared  Forms  of  Art,  to  bring  upon  men 
strong  delusion,  that  they  might  believe  a  lie,  and  embrace  it 
with  faith,  that  they  might  he  saved.  We  cannot  receive 
such  a  scheme.  We  regard  it  as  a  corruption  of  God's  holy 
truth — a  subversion  of  the  most  fundamental  and  vital  doc- 
trines of  Christianity;  as  destructive  of  all  confidence  in  re- 
velation itself;  in  one  word,  as  "another  Gospel." 

IX.  Has  Dr.  Bushnell  retracted amj  of  these  doctrines? 
Has  his  communication,  embodied  in  the.  report  of  the  Ma- 
jority, contradicted  them  ? 

■  We  inquire,  1st,  Concerning  the  Trinity.    In  that  commu- 
nication Dr.  Bushnell  says : 

"I  start  with  the  conception  of  the  One  God,  different,  I 
suppose,  in  no  wise,  from  the  one  substance  or  homousion 
of  the  Church, — which  one  God  is  developed  to  us,  or  becomes 
a  subject  of  knowledge  under  the  conditions  of  a  three-fold 
personality.  I  take  the  three,  therefore,  in  their  threeness,  as 
distinct  grammatical  personalities,  as  thev  are  practically 
employed  in  the  Bible,  acting  and  interacting  mutually  to- 
wards each  other,  as  the  Bible  represents  ;  only  refusing  to 
investigate  their  interior  mystery — believing  that  in  such  a  use 
of  them,  I  receive  in  the  truest  and  fullest  manner  the  One 
God.  The  Trinity  and  Unity  as  thus  set  forth,  I  constantly 
preach  in  public,  regarding  it  as  necessary  to  the  efficacy  of 
the  Gospel,  in  saving  souls.  I  love  this  Trinity,  I  live  upon 
it.  Without  it  I  feel  that  I  could  not  work  my  mind  and 
heart  in  the  private  exercises  of  my  own  Christian  life." 

Is   there  here   any  retraction  of  what  Dr.  Bushnell   has 


29 

taught  in  his  book  ?  It  is  not  pretended  that  there  is.  Is 
there  here  any  contradiction  of  what  he  has  taught  in  his 
book  ?  Not  even  the  shadow  of  it.  Nor  does  it  appear  that 
such  was  his  design,  or  that  he  would  allow  it  to  be  the  fact  if 
it  were  so  charged.  The  only  difference  is,  that  in  this  com- 
munication, he  has  dealt  in  general  terms,  which  in  his  book 
he  has  fully  explained ;  and  that  explanation  is,  that  there  is 
no  Trinity  in  the  Godhead,  but  only  an  instrumental  Trinity, 
produced  and  adequately  accounted  for  by  a  process  of  reve- 
lation,—a  Trinity  which,  even  as  a  representation,  is  probably 
casual,  and  finally  to  vanish  away. 

The  only  thing  insisted  on  in  the  report  is,  that  Dr.  Bush- 
nell  preaches  the  Trinity,  and  lives  upon  it  in  his  Christian 
experience  ;  just  as  he  tinds  it  revealed  in  the  Bible  ;  and  that 
a  minister  should  be  held  responsible,  not  for  his  theories,  but 
for  his  preaching,  and  for  holding  the  facts  of  the  Gospel. 

But  Dr.  Bushnell  has  set  forth  in  his  book,  lohat  facts,  and 
ichat  Ti-inity,  he  finds  in  the  Bible.  Are  we-  to  understand 
that  his  preaching  is  contradictory  to  these  ?  or  does  his  ex- 
planation imply  that  his  preaching  is  even  different  from  the 
representations  which  he  has  given  in  his  book  ?  We  see 
not  the  slightest  reason  to  suppose  so.  We  regard  the  book, 
therefore,  as  the  true  explanation  of  the  more  general  state- 
ments of  the  communication  embodied  in  the  report ;  and  we 
have  already  declared,  that  in  our  view,  the  doctrine  of  the 
book  is  a  denial  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  as  it  stands 
in  the  formulas  of  our  churches,  and  as  it  stands  connected 
with  the  other  fundamental  doctrines  of  the  Gospel. 

We  inquire,  2d,  of  the  explanation  concerning  the  doctrine 
oi  Justification  hy  Faith. 

The  communication  inserted  in  the  majority  report  is  in 
these  words,  viz. : 

"  I  hold  most  emphatically  the  doctrine  of  Justification  by 
Faith,  and  that  any  and  every  form  of  religion  which  propos- 
es to  save  mankind,  on  terms  of  merit  or  desert,  is  not  Chris- 
tianity. As  regards  the  ground  of  Justification,  I  believe  that 
without  something  done,  which  in  Christ  is  done,  to  declare 


30 

the  righteousness  of  God,  and  maintain  the  sanctity  of  law,  a 
free  pardon  offered  to  sinners  would  be  nearly  equivalent  to  a 
dissolution  of  Government.  At  the  same  time  I  look  upon 
Christ  as  fulfilling  the  highest  and  principal  office  of  his  Mes- 
siahship  by  means  of  the  incarnation  itself,  that  is,  by  the  rev- 
elation he  makes  of  God's  feelings  towards  us,  in  and  through 
the  human  state  assumed,  and  the  immense  power  he  exerts, 
or  is  to  exert,  in  this  manner,  over  our  spiritual  character.  He 
is  then  emphatically  '  The  Life,'  the  new-creating  grace  of 
God — the  wisdom  of  God  and  the  power.  To  preach  him  in 
this  character,  is  my  deepest  study,  and  my  in  tensest  love  to 
him  centers  here." 

Now  when  one  declares,  in  a  formal  explanation  of  his 
views,  upon  their  being  called  in  question,  that  he  holds  most 
emphatically  "  The  doctrine  of  Justification  hy  Faith,''  he  is 
bound  to  use  the  terms.  Justification  and  Faith,  in  their  cur- 
rent sense,  as  he  knows  they  will  be  received  by  those  whom 
he  addresses,  and  by  the  intelligent  Christian  community  be- 
fore whom  that  explanation  is  to  be  spread  and  have  its  effect; 
that  is,  in  the  sense  in  which  they  are  current  among  the  or- 
thodox churches,  the  orthodox  ministers,  and  in  the  orthodox 
standard  writers  and  formulas.  To  use  them  in  a  sense  fun- 
damentally different  from  this,  when  they  can  exonerate  him 
from  heresy  only  by  being  understood  in  the  current  sense,  is 
to  pass  off  a  counterfeit  as  current  and  genuine  coin. 

Does  Dr.  Bushnell  then  mean  by  the  words  "  Justification 
by  Faith,"  what  those  words  mean  in  their  current  sense,  and 
what  they  will  commonly  be  understood  to  mean  by  our  min- 
isters and  churches  ? 

If  so,  then  he  has  retracted  and  renounced  all  that  he  has 
taught  on  this  subject  in  his  book.  If  this  be  so — if  your  As- 
sociation have  received  evidence  that  it  is  so — we  shall 
greatly  rejoice,  and  only  demand  that  the  evidence  of  such 
retraction  be  made  as  unequivocal  and  as  public,  as  your  re- 
port, and  as  the  book  itself  If  this  be  not  so,  then  we  re- 
spectfully submit,  that  our  brethren  of  the  Hartford  Central 
Association  have  inadvertantly  accepted  a  spurious  Justifica- 
tion by  Faith,  instead  of  the  true  one  ;  and  have  been  made  the 
instrument  of  passing  off  upon  the  Christian  public,  a  Justifi- 


31 

cation  by  Faith  which  the  orthodox  Christian  pubhc  have  only  to 
know,  to  pronounce  it  spurious.  If  Dr.  Bushnell  has  retracted 
the  doctrine  of  his  book,  on  the  subject  of  Justification  by  Faith, 
it  is  well.  If  he  has  not,  then  we  refer  to  those  doctrines  in 
the  passages  which  we  have  cited,  in  groof  of  the  justice  of 
our  conviction,  that  he  does  not  hold  "  The  doctrine  of  Justi- 
fication by  Faith,"  which  those  ternis  currently  represent,  and 
which  they  will  by  our  ministers  and  churches  be  understood 
to  indicate  :  but  that  he  holds  to  a  Justification,  and  a  Faith 
— and  to  a  Justification  hy  Faith — diametrically  opposed  to  the 
common  orthodox  doctrine  known  by  that  name,  and  utterly 
subversive  of  it. 

It  is  on  this  account  that  we  regard  the  book  as  the  more 
dangerous,  and  the  more  reprehensible, — that  while  it  denies 
the  fundamental  doctrines  of  the  Gospel,  and  substitutes  in  their 
places  dogmas  which  are  contrary  to  and  subversive  of  the 
same,  it  still  employs  the  loords  Trinity,  Atonement,  Redemp- 
tion, Faith,  Justification,  as  though  it  were  not  denying, — but 
as  though  it  were  inculcating, — the  great  truths  which  these 
terms  currently  represent.  In  our  view,  therefore,  it  is  not 
by  any  deep  "  Chemistry  of  thought,"  but  by  a  simple  and  un- 
warrantable change  of  names,  that  the  book  proposes  to  fuse 
down,  and  unite  in  one  homogeneous  substance,  systems  of 
faith  as  irreconcilable  as  the  doctrine  of  Christ  and  the  doc- 
trine of  devils ;  calling  evil  good,  and  good  evil ;  putting  bit- 
ter for  sweet,  and  sweet  for  bitter. 

We  becj  leave,  also,  to  call  vour  attention  to  another  im- 
portant  error — on  pp.  97,  98 — viz.,  that  a  man  is  not  responsi- 
ble for  his  belief,  whether  he  holds  the  truth  or  rejects  it. 
The  passages  are  in  these  words  : — "  I  suppose  it  is  proper  to 
say,  that  I  did  not  prepare  the  occasions  on  which  these  Dis- 
courses were  delivered,  and  seem  scarcely  to  have  chosen  the 
subjects  themselves.  Indeed,  I  seem,  too,  as  regards  the 
views  presented,  to  have  had  only  about  the  same  agency  in 
forming  them,  that  I  have  in  preparing  the  blood  I  circulate, 
and  the  anatomic  frame  1  occupy.  They  are  not  my  choice,  or 
invention,  so  much  as  a  necessary  growth,  whose  process  I 


32 

can  hardly  trace  myself.  And  now,  in  giving  them  to  the 
pubHc,  I  seem  only  to  have  about  the  same  kind  of  option  left 
me  that  I  have  in  the  matter  of  appcainng  in  corporal  mani- 
festation myself, — about  the  same  anxiety,  I  will  add,  concern- 
ing the  unfavorable  judgments  to  be  encountered ;  for  though 
a  man's  opinions  are  of  vastly  greater  moment  than  his  looks, 
yet  if  he  is  equally  simple  in  them,  as  in  his  growth,  and 
equally  subject  to  his  law,  he  is  responsible  only  in  the  same 
degree,  and  ought  not,  in  fact,  to  suffer  any  greater  concern 
about  their  reception,  than  about  the  judgments  passed  ujjon 
his  person." 

We  also  call  your  attention  to  the  views  of  the  author 
of  the  book  on  the  subject  of  Creeds, — on  p.  82 — viz. :  "  Per- 
haps it  is  on  this  account  that  I  have  never  been  able  to  sym- 
pathize at  all  with  the  abundant  protesting  of  the  New  Eng- 
land Unitarians  against  Creeds.  So  far  from  suffering  even 
the  least  consciousness  of  constraint,  or  op)pression,  under  any 
creed',  I  have  been  readier  to  accept  as  great  a  number  as  fell 
in  my  way:  for  when  they  are  subjected  to  the  deepest 
chemistry  of  thought,  that  which  descends  to  the  point  of  re- 
lationship between  the  fortn  of  the  truth  and  its  interior 
forjnless  nature,  they  become,  thereupon,  so  elastic,  and  run 
so  freely  into  each  other,  that  one  seldom  need  have  any  dif- 
ficulty in  accepting  as  many  as  are  offered  hitji." 

We  deem  that  we  might  justly  advert  to  other  important 
matters  contained  in  the  book  :  its  views  of  language,  which 
we  view  as  teaching  men  lightly  to  regard  the  difference  be- 
tween truth  and  error,  and  as  impugning  the  sincerity  and 
sufficiency  of  the  revelation  given  to  us  by  God ;  its  teachings 
with  regard  to  inspiration,  and  its  implication  relative  to  the 
renewing  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  whose  essential  personality  the 
book  denies.  We,  however,  waive  all  consideration  of  these 
topics  further  than  to  request  you, — if  you  shall  see  cause  to 
reconsider  your  doings — to  give  to  these  matters  the  attention 
which  their  importance  demands. 

Such,  in  our  view,  is  the  scheme  of  doctrine  to  which  your 
decision  has  given  your  sanction,  as  not  inconsistent  with  the 


33 

faith  of  our  churches  so  far  as  justly  to  subject  one  who  teaches 
it  even  to  a  trial  for  heresy.  In  our  view,  so  far  as  these  doc- 
trines shall  prevail,  the  Gospel  of  Christ  will  be  as  prevalently 
rejected  and  trodden  down.  If  they  pass  among  us  not  only 
without  ecclesiastical  censure,  but  with,  an  express  ecclesiasti- 
cal allowance, — and  if  our  churches  and  associations  shall,  by 
their  silence,  acquiesce  in  such  a  decision, — then  a  good  stand- 
ing in  the  church,  and  in  the  ministry  among  us,  ought  not,  in 
our  view,  to  be  any  longer  regarded  as  even  prima  facie  evi- 
dence of  soundness  in  the  faith  :  nor  could  we,  in  such  an 
event,  desire  that  it  should  be  so  considered  by  the  orthodox 
churches  in  our  land.  Such  a  wide-spread  indifference  to  the 
truth  we  should  regard  as  a  matter  greatly  to  be  deplored. 
And  now,  brethren,  with  all  due  affection  and  esteem,  arro- 
gating to  ourselves  no  superiority  or  authority,  and  wishing 
you  grace,  mercy,  and  peace  through  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord, 
we  make  to  you  this  our  respectful  but  earnest  Remonstrance 
AND  Complaint.  We  entreat  you  to  reconsider  your  doings, 
and  to  redress  the  injury,  which,  as  we  believe,  you  have  in- 
advertently done  to  our  churches,  to  the  truth,  to  the  cause  of 
salvation,  and  to  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  the  adorable  Re- 
deemer who  bought  us  with  his  blood. 

Edwin  Hall,  Moderator. 

Theophilus  Smith,  Scribe. 


34 


THE    REPLY, 


"  Hartford,  March  6,  1850. 
To  THE  Members  of  the  Fairfield  West  Association  : 

Drar  Brethren  : — A  special  meeting  of  the  Hartford 
Central  Association  was  held  in  Hartford,  at  the  house  of  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Clarke,  on  Tuesday,  March  5th,  to  entertain  your 
Remonstrance  and  Complaint  in  reference  to  the  action  of 
Association  upon  the  book  of  Dr.  Bushnell,  entitled  "  God  in 
Christ."  Present  —  Rev.  Messrs.  Robbins,  D.D.,  Porter, 
D.D.,  Hawes,  D.D.,  Bushnell,  U.D.,  Scranton,  Bartlet,  Spring, 
Hempsted,  Woodruff,  Seward,  W.  Wright,  Richardson, 
Clarke,  Patton,  McLean,  Raymond,  Searle,  Grant,  and  J.  L. 
Wright. 

The  following  resolutions  were  passed,  and  the  undersigned 
were  appointed  a  committee  to  transmit  them  to  the  Mode- 
rator of  your  Association. 

D.  M.  Seward,  Moderator 

of  Hartford  Central  Ass'n. 

John  A.  Hempsted,  Scribe. 


R  esolutions. 

"Resolved,  That  we  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  a  Remon- 
strance and  Complaint  from  our  brethren  of  Fairfield  Asso- 
ciation, on  the  subject  of  our  decision  respecting  tlie  publica- 
tion of  Dr.  Bushnell,  entitled  "God  in  Christ;"  that  we  grate- 
fully accept  their  fraternal  admonitions,  and  sympathize  with 
them  in  their  attachment  to  those  doctrines  of  the  Gospel 
which  have  been  supposed  to  be  controverted  in  the  above- 
mentioned  publication. 


35 

"  Resolved,  That,  having  carefully  examined  'the  book  of 
Dr.  Bushnell,  and  heard  his  vindication  of  himself  against  the 
charges  of  heresy  brought  against  him  from  various  quarters, 
and,  after  solemn  deliberation,  come  to  the  conclusion  of 
whicji  our  brethren  complain,  we  cannot,  with  all  our  respect 
for  their  judgment,  think  it  consistent  with  the  established 
rules  of  judicial  proceedings,  or  with  justice  to  ourselves  or  to 
Dr.  Bushnell,  to  review  that  decision,  or  institute  a  new  in- 
vestigation of  the  case,  until  new  evidence  of  a  decisive  cha- 
racter shall  be  presented  to  us. 

"Resolved,  That  we  have  carefully  considered  the  statements 
and  arguments  presented  to  us  by  the  Fairfield  West  Associa- 
tion ;  that  in  making  up  our  decision  we  allowed  greater 
weight  to  the  statement  of  Dr.  Bushnell,  as  published  in  con- 
nection with  it,  than  our  brethren  of  that  Association  appear 
to  be  willing  to  allow  it ;  and  that  we  protest  against  the  con- 
clusion that  we  give  our  sanction  to  any  peculiarities  of  Dr. 
Bushnell's  scheme  of  doctrine." 


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